


mad art thou in recounting

by Kells



Series: The Varied Adventures of the Captain and Mrs. Cap [5]
Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Fantastic Four, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Blood and Violence, F/M, Female Steve Rogers, Hurt/Comfort, Loki says he does what he wants but does he?, Memory Magic, Mind Control, Protective Steve Rogers, Psychic Violence, random unprovoked Cyclops-bashing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-05
Updated: 2015-10-24
Packaged: 2018-01-18 05:58:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 22
Words: 63,459
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1417732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kells/pseuds/Kells
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Champions Initiative in its first phase: Iron Man has long since accepted leadership, Hawkeye and the Black Widow alternate between taking point and operating as a splinter cell unto themselves, Dr. Banner repeatedly declines the spot they keep open for him, and Thor comes and goes as time and his father permit. Loki, among others, causes problems for everyone. Is there a place here (now) for James and Stephanie Barnes, lately of 1940s Brooklyn, and will they even want it?</p><p>TL;DR: in case of blue and glowing cube thing, DESTROY AT ONCE, POSSIBLY WITH AXE.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. hands across the table

**Author's Note:**

> this time chapter titles are songs from the 30s and 40s; if I figure out how to include them maybe I will?
> 
> the title of the fic is from the Poetic Edda, though; unedited it goes "mad art thou, Loki/in recounting [whatever he's recounting at the time]" and repeats a few times in the Lokasenna where Loki systematically insults everyone he knows and then is chained to a rock and has poison dripped on him. lovely.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bruce and Steph jump to conclusions, Tony is apologetic and Bucky is long-suffering.

“Tony!”

Knowing Tony Stark the way he did, Bruce Banner headed for the kitchen as soon as he was through the door. He could already hear the unmistakable clink of metal on ceramic, so he went right on talking as he made his way over.

“Is it true you have Captain America here? I can't believe I had to hear that from Natasha. You're supposed to share your research, Stark. I hope you know I get first dibs on his-“

“On his what?”

It wasn’t Tony in there at all: a blonde woman wearing a man’s dark dress shirt over a tank top and jeans smiled sunnily at Bruce. Her intelligent eyes were curious, her pretty face open and friendly. She was holding hands with the guy whose shirt she was probably wearing- from their matching rings Bruce gathered that he was her husband. The young man lounged against the counter in a T-shirt and grey slacks, glaring half-heartedly as he stirred his coffee with his free hand.

“How is that damn nickname still around?”

His wife smacked his arm, whispering something in a voice so low that even Bruce could barely make it out; the guy grinned and nodded. Bruce wondered how Tony had managed not only to get himself a pair of super-powered interns but end up liking them enough to give them the run of his family home in the time Bruce had been away.

"Is SI doing some kind of exchange with Xavier's this summer?" 

Their matching expressions of utter bafflement answered that question. They were too old to be high-schoolers anyway, but there wasn’t any other way he knew of to ask whether someone was a mutant without being hugely offensive.

“Never mind,” Bruce smiled.

“Pardon the guesswork; I should know by now it’s a shocking habit.”

“Sherlock Holmes!” the young man cried triumphantly.

“We definitely know that one. _A Study in Scarlet_? No, the other one, with the wife and the guy with the messed-up leg.”

“ _The Sign of Four_ ,” his wife supplied, then grinned apologetically at Bruce. “Sorry, we almost never get to do this these days.”

Bruce shrugged gamely, having no objections to a little Sherlockian enthusiasm from time to time. In a show of fellow geekery, he answered her first question with more of the truth than he would usually share with strangers.

“On his bloodwork, I was going to say. Is Tony around? Erskine’s serum’s a long-standing interest of mine, and if I could just get a look at the-”

“No way.”

It was like flicking a switch: their relaxed laughter vanished completely. In the blink of an eye, the woman’s easy grin turned into a truly hostile scowl; her husband stepped away from the counter, abruptly cold and severe. It was suddenly obvious, at least to someone with Bruce’s particular awareness of these things, that the guy was army trained.

His watch began to beep.

“No way,” the young woman said again, stalking towards Bruce in her agitation.

“What the hell is Tony thinking? _Share his research?_ ”

Bruce had been a grad student once: he remembered when any threat to his funding had felt like another Pearl Harbour. Maybe that was all this was? He made an effort to speak placatingly.

“Don’t worry, this is all above board. Tony’s got no stake in the serum stuff at all. He’s probably told you twenty times by now, Stark Industries is mostly involved in the recovery itself- because of his dad, you know? There’s no competition- our interests are entirely separate.”

The husband, who had smiled slightly at the mention of Howard Stark, now wore a wry expression, but his wife didn’t give an inch. Her grip on his wrist was close to white-knuckled.

“You know who else had a long-standing interest in that bloody formula? Johann Schmidt. Arnim Zola. Wolfgang von Strucker.”

The shrill, repetitive noise picked up speed.

“Steph,” her husband intervened, affectionate but reproachful.

“You really wanna go straight there with this? We don’t know anything about-”

“We know he wants to-”

“It’s okay,” Bruce interrupted, striving to speak reasonably as total strangers discussed the merits of comparing him to some of the worst people in the history of his profession.

“Tony knows exactly what I-”

“It’s not Stark’s call anymore. There’s no Captain America project. There’s no Captain America. He’s just Bucky Barnes, and no one’s going to lay a hand on him as long as I have any say.”

“Stephanie,” her husband tried again.

“Listen, a chroí. I don’t think he means-”

Bruce wondered if he ought to take consolation in the fact that she wasn’t allowing her husband to finish any of his sentences, either.

“I don’t care what he means. How can you be defending him? You didn’t think this was a good idea the first time!”

Bruce tried to take deep and calming breaths. They didn’t help that much.

“It’s not that controversial. If you just think about the greater-”

This time she didn’t interrupt, but threw her hands up in disgust, not deigning to tell him what she found so offensive about the greater good.

“Look,” Bruce bit out.

“I don’t know who the hell you think you are, but-”

“Hey, you wanna watch your tone with her?”

Of course the military guy would draw the line at outright aggression towards his wife, Bruce thought ruefully. Possibly he should have thought of that before burning the only bridge the woman in question wasn’t actively setting alight.

“Stay out of this,” Bruce warned him. Stephanie actually laughed; the guy shook his head almost regretfully.

“It’s way too late for that, pal.”

Bruce’s overtaxed watch sounded like someone was flatlining.

He lurched towards the counter, seeking the edge as a stabilising point of contact. Stephanie took an uncertain step backwards.

Her husband, entirely misreading the interaction, grabbed Bruce’s arm roughly.

“Don’t you touch her.”

The Other Guy threw him across the room.

“Bucky!”

Stephanie ducked under the table rather than skirting around it, emerging with a matte metal disc that she held confidently as she flung herself between the gargantuan green figure and her dazed but rallying husband.

“What the hell are you?”

The giant growled, deep and threatening. The couple in front of him assumed a defensive position they had relied on many times before.

“Hey!” Tony Stark cried in Iron Man’s modulated voice. He landed smoothly between them.

“None of that! Stop it right now. I mean it. You guys can’t fight, I have so few friends I'm not pretending to like!”

“Shell-head,” the Hulk smiled in recognition, then glared at Steph and her husband.

“They don’t like Banner,” he said accusingly.

Iron Man’s faceplate slid back to reveal Tony’s resigned expression.

“Did Banner try to stick a needle somewhere he shouldn’t without offering to buy them dinner first?”

The Hulk glowered, but said nothing further. Tony took a deep breath.

“This is going to turn out to be my fault, isn’t it? Come on, big guy, let’s go cool off. My dad will haunt me if I let you smash these two. I’ll explain as we go.”

He turned back to the couple for a moment.

“I promise I’m not selling you out. He’s a good guy. As you can see his stake in Erskine’s work is personal. Please don’t leave and join the X-Men.”

“They don’t know the X-kids,” the Hulk offered consolingly.

“Should meet ol’ one-eye, they’ll like him.”

“Hey, don’t call my friends assholes,” Tony protested. The giant roared with appreciative laughter.

“Howard’s son is pals with a serum-monster,” James Barnes recapped as they watched Iron Man lead his friend away, chattering in his easy, upbeat way.

“I guess that’s no more unnatural than the Dodgers playing out of California,” Steph said philosophically. She was already running an assessing hand over Bucky’s forearm, examining his injuries with expert attention.

“Flex your wrist for me a sec- yeah, that’s fine. I wonder whether that serum _makes_ people want to throw you around or if it’s just that only jackasses experiment with it in the first place. Come on, I wanna get some ice on your eye before it looks like you went up against a tank.”

“I did that,” Bucky reminded her with a grin.

“In Germany, remember? Winter of ‘44. Fewer bruises, more burns.”

“Poor Bucky. Do you remember what it feels like to go a month without someone trying to break your ribs? I don’t think I do.”

For some reason, this made her husband throw his arms around her in a quick and fervent hug.

“You are my most favourite thing of things, Stephanie Rogers-I-mean-Barnes.”

She tilted her head at him.

“That’s not any kind of answer, J. Sometimes I can’t tell whether you’re concussed or just a bein’ a sweetheart.”

He laughed and leaned in to kiss her cheek; she turned her head at the last second and smiled when their lips met instead.

When Tony returned as promised, he found his father’s friends in the living room. Stephanie, occupying a plush old armchair, was speaking to her husband in a low, urgent voice while he listened patiently at her feet. He was leaning back against her knees, holding an ice-pack over half his face.

“Ow,” Tony winced as he took the chair across from her. Bucky nodded in greeting; Steph stopped ranting to smile hers.

“So, that wasn’t how I was going to introduce you to Bruce. Or tell you about the army’s experiments with Erskine’s formula. I’m so sorry. He’s been in India for months, way out in the who-knows-where without WiFi- we’ve done WiFi, right, you know what that is?”

They nodded with the tolerant looks they usually assumed when he took it upon himself to make sure they understood the technology he also took it upon himself to surround them with.

“Yeah, so I never had a chance to tell him about all this, and I guess, I mean-”

“He thought 'Captain America' was dead,” Steph realised. She cuffed her husband gently round the head.

“And you caught on way before I did and said nothing because you are an ass.”

“More like because I couldn’t get a word in, Agent Aggression.”

She looked apologetic for a moment, but then frowned at Tony, deeply concerned.

“Are people still trying to recreate that formula? Is that what SHIELD wanted too?”

Nearly three months since they had broken out of the disconcerting mock-up of a 1940s hospital which had been their introduction to 2012, they still had no clear explanation of why SHIELD had been so determined to keep Stephanie and James apart during their recovery.

“I’ve wondered,” Tony admitted. “In this context it doesn’t matter, though- at least not in practical terms. Howard made damn sure the legal stuff was water-tight. I let them get involved in treatment because they have way better medical facilities than SI, but they can’t do anything to you or with you or about you without explicit consent and permission to publish.”

“How’d he manage that?”

“SHIELD was business; you guys were family. He was always very clear about that. He would never have mentioned any of it, I bet, except everyone already knew about his arctic missions.”

They were quiet for a moment, remembering the man they had known in such different capacities. It looked like Bucky might speak, but before he could Tony’s phone blared, harsh and loud after that contemplative pause. Tony answered it with a broad grin.

“Tasha! Are you two on your way? You’ve already missed a- what?”

Steph tensed as the smile slid off Tony’s face; Bucky moved to get to his feet.

“Are you sure? _Loki?_ Isn’t he supposed to be dead? When does he ever show up without Blondie?”

Their host winced as a woman’s tight, unhappy voice hammered home her point. Bucky, who could make out more of what she was saying than Steph, frowned as he automatically offered her a hand up.

“Okay, okay, I didn’t say I don’t believe you. I’ll go check it out. You guys just get here when you can.”

“Should we come with?”

Tony, slipping his phone back into his breast pocket, looked at Steph incredulously.

“Points for enthusiasm, Mrs. Cap, but you don’t even know where I’m going.”

Bucky’s increasingly impressive black eye made his brooding look seem all the more grim.

“If this ‘cosmic cube’ you're talking about is blue and glowing, we’re definitely coming.”

“That bloody thing.”

Stephanie stepped closer to her husband and reached for his hand again. Tony nodded slowly.

“Of course, wasn’t Schmidt way into all that mythological stuff? Yeah, it’s the same cube. Don’t suppose you two know anything about it that might help us here? A guy we thought was dead, who hates us because we like his brother, is trying to steal it.”

“From where?”

Tony looked nothing short of sheepish.

“Here. It’s down in the basement.”

Bucky stared at him in unconcealed astonishment.

“Have you just had that thing _in your family home_ for however many years?”

Tony shrugged.

“Pretty much. The SHIELD guys come and borrow it sometimes. No one knows enough about it to care either way, Cap. Except Loki, apparently.”

Stephanie narrowed her eyes.

“Is the brother you like named Thor by any chance?”

The 1920s reading curriculum must have been impressively broad, Tony thought. He nodded again, and they split up briefly. When they reconvened on the stairs, Tony was back in the suit while the Captain and his wife wore the Starktech variant of SHIELD’s high-impact field gear. The shield, of course, was safe on Bucky’s arm; they must have had six guns between them. Tony filled them in on Thor and Loki as they descended to stake out Howard’s downstairs vault.

“Thor showed up in New Mexico some time last year; his dad’s idea of putting him on the naughty step, it turns out. Loki came looking for trouble, it was twelve types of chaos until we figured out it was an inheritance dispute, of all things. And he was freaking out about maybe being adopted or something, I dunno, I don’t generally listen that closely when he talks. So Jane Foster and Reed Richards and their astro-type friends got together to restore that bridge of theirs and Thor took the fight back home. When he came back he swore up and down Loki was dead- poor guy was really broken up.”

“About the guy who was trying to kill him over their inheritance?”

Tony shrugged.

“Apparently they were close as kids.”

Steph looked disturbed. Bucky squeezed her hand.

“And that’s the guy we’re going after today?”

“More like he’s coming after us. Or not us, just the cube, but it’s Loki- once you’re in his way there’s no way to guess whether he’ll decide to kill you or humiliate you or change the colour of your eyes just to confuse your friends. Makes sense, though – if Thor and daddy cut him off he’s got no way off this island, and your blue and glowing dohickey does _seem_ to have some kind of interstellar component. Howard always thought it might have some application in transdimensional-”

“”You’re losin’ us,” Bucky interrupted. “All we know is it goes all bright if you touch it, and then your face melts or something."

He shuddered. Stephanie patted his arm as if she couldn’t help but comfort him, but she was definitely smirking.

“Is it just me, or was our _last_ mission helping Stark stop a guy who thought he was a god from doing something crazy with the blue and glowing cube thing?”

Her husband shrugged.

“Another day, another maniac with a god complex.”

Tony grinned.

“Welcome to the 21st Century.”

Stephanie snorted.

“What, you think you invented that? Our last go-round we had Schmidt and the HYDRA crazies, plus Hitler, Stalin and Mussolini making nice with each other while setting fire to the world. And that was just the European theatre.”

Bucky grinned; Tony shook his head.

“You two haven’t met Viktor von Doom yet.”

“That’s never his real name.”

“It so is, Cap. I know this, that guy Reed I was talking about was honest-to-god friends with him in college. I should call him, now I think of it.”

“Stark, there is no way _Viktor von Doom_ is a real person’s real name.”

“Says _Bucky Barnes_.”

“His real name is James Buchanan Barnes. Those are all of them perfectly good names. Well, Buchanan’s not great, but it’s not _von Doom._ ”

“Thanks,” Bucky said drily.

“Tag-teamed by the Barneses,” Tony sighed as they reached the vault.

“Dad would be so proud. Fine, whatever, Viktor von Doom’s parents were trolling him and you two knew all about maniacs with god complexes before the rest of us were born. Just be careful, all right.”

His voice turned serious; there was a weight to his manner that suggested both age and experience.

“Loki talks like a whiny teenager with daddy issues, but he’s much more dangerous than he looks, he’s very used to getting what he wants, and he's way more creative when people make him mad. And, trust me, he’s mad enough without any outside help. In both senses.”

“Well,” a crisp, cultured voice echoed around them. “If that isn’t the nicest thing anyone’s ever said about me.”


	2. si tu savais (if only you knew)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki jumps to conclusions as well, Bucky is protective and pays for it, everyone else is stressed.

Tony’s gleaming suit, which fascinated Bucky endlessly but never failed to give Steph the creeps, looked positively nightmarish in the dark basement. Lit only by a diffuse glow in that unmistakable shade of blue, Iron Man looked way too much like a HYDRA cannoneer. Stephanie shuddered, then shook herself slightly and tried not to think about the Alps. Bucky, always attentive, bumped her shoulder in silent solidarity as Tony addressed the interloper.

“You do know that housebreaking is much lower down the villain scale than regicide, fratricide and setting a remote-control flame-thrower on New Mexico, right? Hi, by the way. I must say you’re looking pretty spry for a dead guy.”

The newcomer, who had been studying the cube with sharp, fascinated eyes, opened his arms to them as though in welcome as he turned towards them.

“I haven’t ruled out genocide yet,” Loki assured him. “And it transpires that I have no brother, so fratricide is out of the question, but you may tell Thor I will not hesitate to kill him if the opportunity presents itself.  As for regicide-”

When he smiled, it was much easier to reconcile the urbane gentleman in front of them with the trickster of mythology.

“I certainly hope there will be none of that, because it is my intention to be King.”

“King of…the States?”

Bucky sounded entirely skeptical. Iron Man twitched as if Tony wished he could shoot them a warning look but realized in time that the eyeslits in his faceplate didn’t work that way. Bucky's face didn’t change, but he did take a single step forward so that there was definitely something- someone- between Steph and Loki. The would-be king tracked their interaction with keen attention.

“Do not imagine that I care how you draw your boundaries. I will rule all Midgard."

He addressed Tony again.

"Who are these two? Do Thor’s friends shrink from me already?”

“Naw,” Steph said as if she had the slightest idea what Thor’s friends were thinking or even who they were beyond Tony's sketchy description.

“But we were closer. Will you close that box before it takes someone's face off?”

“They’re much more interesting than the archer and his woman.”

Loki was still talking to Tony, but he was watching Steph speculatively as Bucky took another little step towards her. 

“If I tell Tasha you called her that you better hope Thor finds you before she does.”

“They would not fight you,” the trickster murmured as though he had not heard the younger Stark at all.

“And you know the Cosmic Cube, it seems. I believe you could be of use to me.”

“I don’t think so,” she disagreed, glancing instinctively towards Bucky as Loki’s eyes, glittering in the dark, fixed on her face.

“She definitely can’t, pal.”

“I say she can. You will find I am often right.”

The trickster swung the stick in his hands- Steph felt her breath catch as the harmless dandy’s cane transformed smoothly into an ornate, scythe-like weapon which glowed with the same unnatural light as the cube.

“Not about this.”

Loki was fast, but Bucky had never needed much warning when he thought Steph was in trouble. He shoved her out of the way, sending her stumbling into Tony’s outstretched arm as the glowing sceptre caught her husband square in the chest.

“James!”

Bucky was looking right at her- for a moment all his emotions were plain on his face, but then his eyes flashed cobalt, his expression shut down, and he turned towards Loki without a word.

“No,” Steph muttered, confused but determined that he would not take another step.

“Bucky, don’t-”

She caught his wrist, but he jerked free easily, snatching his hand back and whirling on her as though he would attack. Iron Man trained his gauntlet’s repulsors on the Captain only to find himself face to barrel with Steph’s pistol. Her eyes never left her husband’s face.

“I said this to your father’s assistant once: if you hurt him I will shoot you. Even if he’s asking for it.”

“Stephanie-”

“I’ll do it if I have to, Ant’ny.”

They both knew perfectly well that her gun couldn't do that much against his _metal suit_ , but Tony hesitantly lowered his arm. Loki let out a self-satisfied chuckle that made Steph’s skin crawl.

“I see this will work just as well. And you _have_ witnessed the power of the Infinity Gems. Your way appears to be much simpler than mine. Effective, however. Yes, perhaps we will attempt it. Come along, Captain.”

Steph swung her gun around so it was aimed between Loki’s eyes.

“Let him go.”

Again, he laughed like the greatest pleasure in life was watching someone try to help her husband get away from yet another god-damned nutcase with too much power.

“Sweet Stephanie, jewel of this young man’s eye. He believes you would fight me for his freedom.”

She fought not to lash out prematurely as Loki patted Bucky’s cheek with horrifying familiarity.

“He does not like the thought of that.”

It was hard to tell- Bucky’s face was completely slack. Steph gritted her teeth against a protest that would only encourage someone like Loki and offered her best impression of Peggy Carter’s stately calm.

“He’ll get over it. I’m telling you to let him go."

“I see that.”

Loki’s grin was more awful than Schmidt’s satanic leer had been because it seemed so much more genuinely gleeful.

“But, you know, I don’t really want to.”

And then they were gone, blinking out of sight without the slightest warning.

“Fuck,” Tony said into the now empty pitch-black space between them. She heard the click of his faceplate locking as he slid it back.

“No, this is okay. We’ll find Thor, he’ll know what to do. Well, he probably won’t, actually, but he’ll go ask his mom or whatever it is he does when Loki’s bugging him. Which is all the time, so they probably have some kind of standard operating procedure, right? It only makes sense. I can get Reed in on this as well, you know, the astr-”

“We don’t need anyone else, we need to hurry. How do we go after them?”

The lights flicked on, leaving them both blinking at the change. Steph, out of sorts and desperate for an answer, swung round with her gun still raised.

“Whoa there. We’re on the same side.”

“She doesn’t know that,” a woman pointed out as Steph’s eyes adjusted enough for her to make out the new arrivals.

“And I think Loki just took her husband.”

“Fuck,” the blonde with the bow said- apparently these were the archer and his woman. It was a little like being back in the army, Steph would have thought if she had any time at all to reflect on other people’s word choice when Bucky had been spirited away before her eyes as though the pixies of his mother’s fairy stories had suddenly turned out to be real. She knew the horizon was tilting, but didn’t realize that it was because she was swaying forward until Tony grabbed her arm to stop her falling.

“Hey,” he said quietly. “It’s not over yet. We’ll find him.”

Steph wrenched her arm out of his armoured grip but fought to smile like Bucky would. It wasn't Tony's fault, she reminded herself. It wasn't.

“If we don’t get a move on he’ll probably find us first.”

“Yeah!” the blonde said with a smile that was equal parts encouraging and outright enthusiastic.

“Because he’s Captain Barnes.”

“Because he’s my James. He’ll always come back to me if he can.”

Her voice shook on the conditional, but the others nodded as though what she said made sense. The elegant redhead moved towards the door, speaking over her shoulder.

“Come upstairs. Tony and Clint can lock down the basement, it doesn't take four people.”

Because this stranger was the only one in the room who wasn’t regarding Steph with the compassionate, slightly panicked sorrow she knew too well from the long nightmare that had been 1937, Steph went upstairs without protest.

* * *

In between realms, James Barnes stares with undisguised wonder at stars that are not of his galaxy. His first words are not the hard-edged confrontation they ought to be.

“What is this place?”

Loki laughs again. It sounds less unhinged than when he was showboating for Steph and Tony, but it still ranks among the bitterest sounds Bucky’s ever heard.

“My new home. A prince of two worlds who is master of none must find solace among the stars.”

Bucky feels his shoulders tense.

“Is that why you’re comin’ after ours?”

“In part.”

“If the other part is to annoy your brother-“

In the last year alone, counting without the ice-gap, Bucky has been flung across the room by one serum-monster and beaten bloody by another, shot, kicked in his already broken ribs and stabbed a couple of times, probably. Steph would know for sure.

None of that stuff ever hurt like this.

“He is not my brother,” Loki hisses as Bucky, eyes tearing, claws uselessly at his chest. He has no idea what Loki is doing or how, but it's not good.

“He is the Allfather’s son, and _they are no kin to me.”_

“Ease up, boss, I only know what people tell me.”

His voice is unsteady already, but maybe that’s not his fault. Loki doesn’t budge.

“Then you should remember you breathe because I allow it, and watch your words.”

That …actually makes sense. It’s about the only thing that does.

“What exactly are we doin’ this for? What did you want with Stephanie?”

“You know how to use this,” Loki says like Bucky should have known that. Suddenly, the blue and glowing- Cosmic Cube sits between them, its uncanny light pulsing placidly in its swirling, strangely contained depths.

“I really don't.”

“Wrong answer, Captain.”

Bucky hears himself gasp as whatever weapon Loki's using drills right through his skull. It seems inconceivable that there isn't any blood, but as far as he can make out his hands come away dry. When he opens his eyes, they’re not standing among the stars any longer.

Johann Schmidt screams as the Cube’s light engulfs him- he turns sightlessly towards them, reaching out wildly; Steph tugs Bucky back with terrified determination. Of course he goes where she leads. A moment later Schmidt is gone, and Bucky is left, heaving and disoriented, with his interrogator.

“I ask again. How did you activate the Cube without a portal or the other gems?”

“Dunno. We didn’t even know it was called that. Or that there were other gems. Do they all melt people who touch them? That's not much of a reason to go looking for them.”

Loki sighs.

"If you want me to try harder to impress you, you need only say so."

This time Bucky wonders if he'll suffocate before he bleeds out. He tries for any one of the many things that have helped before- focusing on her face, thinking about her eyes when she smiles, imagining what she’ll do to Loki when she finds them- but it’s all he can do to stay on his feet and take one scraping breath and then another.

“You drove a man out of your universe. I want to know how.”

Bucky glares right back at Loki. It’s not what tactical would advise- he imagines Phillips scowling while Peggy sighs impatiently and Howard tries and fails not to laugh in the background- but this guy is not being reasonable.

“We didn’t drive him anywhere. We had no idea what the hell that damn thing was. Are you lookin’ at the same thing I am? He just- did that. On his own. We were standing there staring, tryin’a stay out of it. It’s not like he meant to do it either.”

“You lie,” Loki hisses. Bucky would sigh- Loki’s internal contradictions are as much of a headache as whatever he’s doing to get in and out of Bucky’s memory- but he’s not _that_ ready to end this any old way. Steph’s alone in 2012. He can't just leave her there.

“Howard said stop the plane, I went to stop the lousy plane. My gal can’t ever leave damn well alone, so she showed up halfway through the fight. All we knew was we had to get that cube, there was no plan for how or what to do with it.”

“If your strategy is to exasperate me until I hit you harder,” Loki says darkly, “You should know that time is not a factor here. Unconsciousness will not help you for very long, Captain.”

Bucky frowns.

“If you’re already in my head, what do you need me for? Can’t you go ahead and take what you want, and never mind what I think about it?”

Peggy Carter would definitely disapprove; the thought of it very nearly makes Bucky smile. Loki glares more fiercely than Steph ever has, but he has no biting answer to throw back in Bucky's face. Tony had given them a pretty thorough run-down of what their opponent could do, and Bucky knows he would remember mind control.

“It’s not you,” he realises. “There’s someone else giving you this. Which means you’ve made some kind of deal. You're not any kind of king here, either.”

He must be much nearer the mark than Loki was prepared for because the so-called god looks at least as disturbed as outraged. The burning behind Bucky's eyes glows red before his vision sparks white and then fades into blissfully empty black.

“That’s quite enough about me,” Loki says as Bucky blinks groggily. Apparently Loki's warning was for real- it doesn't feel like any time has passed. Bucky swallows hard. His hands are shaking, he notices, displeased.

“Perhaps we need to look more closely at what you remember. Would you like to start with the war, or shall we work up to that?”

As if to show exactly what he can do with these powers that aren’t his, Loki drags his half-conscious victim through a series of brief flashes of his own past- Steph raises Bucky’s rifle with a deadly look, Howard tinkers in some workshop or another while giving Bucky running commentary, Jack and Gary grin madly as Millie Travers lectures them half-jokingly. Steph wheezes and chokes as Bucky holds her tight and begs her to stay calm and keep breathing; Mike Farleigh apologises with frightened sincerity for a murder he definitely didn’t commit. Unexpectedly, the happy memories hurt as much as the others. It is, Bucky supposes, a whole lifetime he’s loved and lost, except for that one bright spark who will be pale and frantic several worlds away.

“Go to Hell,” Bucky spits. Loki must know he can’t help with the god-damned cube by now- perhaps it was naive to think that could be the end to this.

“We may get there before we’re done,” Loki allows. “I rather think that will depend on you.”

Bucky is beginning to hate that smile.

They watch Sarah Rogers hug Winifred warmly while her husband Joe- younger, stronger, not as perpetually tired as Bucky remembers him- cradles a tiny, grey-eyed child in his arms.

Loki makes an impatient noise, and Bucky almost laughs out loud- this is clearly not what the trickster was aiming for at all.

“Took us back too far, huh.”

Not surprisingly, Loki does not answer. Bucky forgets about him entirely when his mother- frightened and unhappy but beautiful like Bucky doesn't remember her being and free of the illness which is sometimes all he can recall when he thinks of her- begins to speak. He hasn’t heard Winifred's voice in, what, seven years? Seventy-five, if you count straight forward from the day she died.

“He said he’d smother the babe if I didn’t stop him crying,” Fred whispers tearfully. Sarah chokes back a gasp. Bucky doesn’t try to conceal his shock and horror; there's no one to see it except a guy who'll probably enjoy it anyway.

“’Course he were too drunk to do it, but I couldn’t let him hurt my boy.”

“I’d think not,” the man who will be Steph's father mutters. He holds the baby closer for a moment, protective, frustrated and steady as rock. Bucky has so few memories of Steph’s da, but now he wishes more than ever that he did- there’s so much of the grown-up Stephanie even in this too-short moment from before she was born.

“You’ll stay with us,” Joe tells Winifred with a gentle smile. His eyes are like his daughter's will be later, warm and wise. Joe, too, is more generous than anyone should be who has lived a whole life with precious little to call his own, let alone to share.

“As long as you need, sweetheart.”

Fred smiles gratefully, but her tears don’t let up. She kisses her tired infant’s crown.

“Christ, Sarah, what do I tell the boy when he’s old enough to ask why his own father doesn't know how to love him?”

Bucky, who has never heard this story beyond the child-friendly “Aunty Fred brought Bucky to visit us, and we loved them so much we never let them leave” version, is spellbound.

With all his attention on his mother’s grief, he doesn’t realise that Loki is no less transfixed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the reason for the tense switch is that they're kind of operating outside of time; I hope that's not too jarring?


	3. ghost of yesterday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steph worries while Loki goes diving in someone else's daddy issues for a change, then the leader of the Chitauri shows up and makes everything worse. Bucky's really not having the best time of it.
> 
> PS if anyone's getting deja vu sorry that is my fault I was being disastrous and deleted this chapter so am now reposting it I'm just cool that way I guess -_-

“Natalia Romanova,” the archer’s girl said as they climbed the stairs.

“I go by Natasha.”

Stephanie nodded with what Bucky had taken to calling her Senator Brandt smile because it was wide, toothy and, if you knew her at all, completely phony.

“Everyone calls me Steph.”

Natasha’s soft curls bounced as she shook her head.

“Everyone should call you Agent Barnes, at least at SHIELD. Stark never let them declassify your given names.”

“You called him Tony earlier.”

Natalia answered in a slightly softer voice- not apologetic, exactly, but as though she realized she’d spoken without thinking, and was surprised at herself for it.

“I meant Stark senior. Tony’s father.”

“Howard,” Stephanie offered as they stepped out at ground level, only to wish she hadn’t- it was too soon to deal with another brisk redhead calling her Agent Barnes and talking about Mr. Stark. Sinking into one of Howard’s leather armchairs, she watched Natasha take the seat opposite with the deliberate grace that had marked all her movements so far and ignored the ache that was the lack of Bucky in her peripheral vision. Steph didn’t want to talk about her friends anymore.

“What do we have on Loki?”

“Practically nothing. No, don’t get up. I’m Clint.”

The agent offered Stephanie his hand as well as a rueful smile.

“I’m so sorry we have to meet this way, Mrs. Barnes.”

He was older than Howard, Steph saw, but younger than his son. For once, that thought didn’t make her want to tear out her hair. Maybe because her arms felt too numb to do it? Possibly she’d change her mind later. Clint Barton was taller than Howard's son, though not by much, and all muscle. This was more especially obvious because his SHIELD-issued combat gear was- unusually, even inappropriately- sleeveless. As a strategic choice it wasn't especially sensible- Steph couldn’t imagine letting her husband go out so exposed. She had no way to guess whether Tony’s specially made armour would offer any protection at all against a man who could _make people disappear._

“Me too, a chara. Tony, I’d really like to see what you’ve got.”

“Is that a good idea?”

Tony couldn’t know how much she hated that tone of voice- kind and sympathetic, nearly wheedling. _Are you sure there are no family members someone should inform?_

“Look,” she said much more stridently than she ever spoke to anyone who wasn’t directly threatening her husband, their friends or the free world. 

“The last time I saw my James it was like he had no idea who I was. He looked right through me, Ant’ny, and then he _vanished from in front of me._ I need to know where he is, how to get him back, and how bad it’s gonna go for him. If you have a quicker way to get the dope I'll sit here ‘til you do, but if you don’t then I really wish you’d all stop dragging this out and _tell me._ ”

“She’s not calling him a dope,” Clint said as Tony opened his mouth. “It means ‘the low-down,’ basically. The trouble is we have next to nothing, Mrs –”

“Please just call me Steph,” she interrupted, unable to articulate how it was hurting her to hear any part of his name when he wasn’t there to answer. Tony seemed to understand, though, because his woeful sympathy was back in force. _I’m afraid there’s been no change, Miss Rogers._ She could scream until her lungs bled later, Steph decided, when he was home and safe and laughing at her. Or running a hand through her hair while he swore up and down that everything was all right again. She’d believe her husband, she thought, but only him and no one else.

“Are you guys gonna give me what I need or should I take this up with your Reed Richards instead?”

* * *

 Bucky hasn’t worked out how he’s still alive. He’s not sure he remembers what it feels like to think a complete thought without being interrupted by Loki’s strange laughter, the undiluted agony of being dragged from one memory to another, or the brief moments of darkness that seem to be his body periodically giving up on the situation.

They have seen every thought he's has ever had about growing up without a father, it feels like. Bucky, barely three years old, fearfully asks his mother when his da is coming back from wherever he's gone off to and whether they’ll have to go away and live with him when that happens. Sarah glares fearsomely when supposedly friendly church-wives wonder well above a whisper whether a woman not living with her husband should really take Communion; Fred keeps her head down, but squeezes her anxious son's hand reassuringly. Steph, now nearly adolescent, doesn't hesitate to attack Mike Rawley with sharp nails and sharper insults when he suggests that Bucky’s parents might never have been married in the first place.  

At least he knows what Tony meant by ‘daddy issues,’ Bucky thinks as the crippling pain behind his eyes begins again.

Three well-intentioned Rogers cousins, recently arrived from Boston for Joe Rogers' funeral and determined to offer assistance even where none is needed or wanted, try in separate turns to usher the six-year-old Bucky towards a seat next to Mrs. Barnes. Stephanie, already overwhelmed and barely keeping it together, looks increasingly likely to start screaming. Sarah takes them all aside and demands that they leave Fred’s boy damn well alone. Joe loved that child like his own son, she says in a tone that dares them to contradict her, and anyone who doubts that doesn’t know enough about their family to comment. Steph and Bucky, still hanging onto each other for dear life, say nothing at all. When their eyes meet, though, they share a little smile for the first time in what feels like months.

That wasn’t so bad. Of course the next one is one of the worst of all.

Bucky, aged about fifteen, unlocks the front door and wonders why his mother is sitting alone in the darkened kitchen.

“Did the power go out? You wanna come downstairs? Everything’s fine at Sarah’s.”

“No,” the adult James Barnes mutters helplessly. “No, this is cruel. She never-”

But he'll never be sure, will he, how much she meant of what she’s about to say. Loki, of course, pays him no attention. On the other hand, it has been several memories since he’s leered or laughed or made strange jibes that aren’t really about Bucky’s life at all. In fact he’s been very quiet, this last long non-while.

“I knew you’d come.”

Winifred rises and moves to meet her son. Bucky frowns- he’s worked the same shifts every week for months now.

“It’s Tuesday. I always-”

She’s not listening.

“I've missed you, you know. Every bloody day since I left you, a mhuirnín.”

That’s definitely not right. Bucky dodges, bewildered, as his mam tries to put her arms around his neck, smiling in a way that he instinctively understands cannot be for him.

“Mam, what-”

The creaking of the door is sweet relief. His mother squints.

“Is that Stephanie Rogers?”

Steph, smart kid, is immediately leery of the whole set-up.

“Who else would it be? What’s going on?”

Bucky tells her all he knows, which is that his mam’s been drinking and is talking to him as if he’s his own father. By the time he’s done, which is barely a minute later, Steph is wide-eyed with concern and his mother is weeping openly in his stiff embrace. Bucky wishes he and Steph could have stayed with Jack and Hannah.

“I gave you everything,” Winifred sobs, utterly defeated.

“Everything I had and everything I could have had, but of course you never needed me that much, did you?”

“Auntín,” Steph says cautiously.

“You know this isn’t George, right? ”

Mother and son both cringe at the name they never speak. Steph squeezes Bucky’s shoulder; there is so much warmth and strength in her frail grip.

“It's just our James, Aunty Fred.”

His mother’s bleary eyes grow suddenly sharp, but they don’t flicker uncertainly towards him or anything like that. She shakes her head, furious, and struggles out of Bucky’s arms.

“You think I don’t know the child of my flesh?”

The child of her flesh shrugs at the girl who will be his wife. He’s about to suggest that they give up on this conversation and put his mam to bed when she speaks again. Winifred’s voice is as thick with pain as it is heavy with conviction.

“It’s a hell of a thing to love someone who'll never be all yours. You be careful, Steph Rogers- he’s still his father’s son. He'll hurt you in the end.”

“You still fear she may be correct.”

The strange thing is that Loki sounds sympathetic- maybe even concerned- and not at all gloating or triumphant. Bucky, armed only with what Tony told him and what he’s learnt from watching the trickster react to what they’ve seen, takes a risk even Steph would balk at. It's probably stupid to push a guy who’s already shown he can wipe the floor with him, but Bucky’s so damn tired of this game.

He meets his captor’s eyes.

“Don’t you?”

As it turns out, Loki has no time to react.

“Trickster,” a sibilant voice demands.

“Why do you make us wait?”

The new arrival is several shades more undeniably alien- in the H.G. Wells sense- than Loki looks or seems. His skin looks grey, though it is hard to tell in the starlight, and its texture would fit somewhere between reptilian and rocky. He looks oddly monastic in his medieval-accented outfit, but Bucky can tell a military bruiser from the next guy as soon as he sees one.

“Our army grows restless while its would-be commander makes conversation with this low creature.”

“Thanks very much,” Bucky drawls.

“I had thought he might offer us an advantage when we re-enter Midgard,” Loki says in an affected tone- stressing “re-enter” to show what he has already done, but also emphasizing that he will still be leading this alleged invasion. Apparently if Loki figures out the Cosmic Cube there will be aliens in New York. Fantastic.

“He has very little useful information to offer.”

“You hope that making him relive his past will induce him to give up what he conceals?”

“Indeed,” Loki smiles, but Bucky is sure that’s not at all what he was doing. The grey guy shakes his hooded head impatiently.

“His own history can only inspire regret- the outcome is already a given. There is a much better way.”

Bucky strongly doubts it will be better from his point of view.

“You will direct your illusions as I show you.”

Loki looks reluctant for a moment, but then inclines his head.

If Bucky thought Loki was being invasive before- whatever’s going on now, he suspects it would be less excruciating to have someone stick a stirrer in his skull and mix his brain up by hand. He clenches his jaw against a scream that feels like it’s leaking out anyway.

Stephanie sobs brokenly as Howard’s son hovers in the background, awkward with urgent, impotent sympathy. Like his father, he is obviously uneasy with a problem that cannot be solved by logic or engineering. Both Loki and the captain stiffen in surprise- this could easily be the present, or the future.

“He promised he wouldn’t leave me, Tony, and what’s the first damn thing he did?”

“He was trying to protect you,” Tony tries hesitantly. Steph shakes her head so hard that her long, slightly crooked braid almost catches her full in the face.

“Goddamn liar promised me he’d find his way home. What the hell am I supposed to do here without him, Ant’ny?”

“Is that a threat, pal?”

The captain sounds more annoyed than intimidated.

“These are your thoughts, James Barnes, not ours.”

Steph Rogers lies on Zola’s operating table, tearfully swearing that she hasn’t betrayed her husband. For some reason they’ve shaved her head. Bucky tells her he’ll kill every goddamn HYDRA agent on the planet. Stephanie tries to smile. Bucky kisses her cheeks, first one and then the other, and holds his wife one last time. He should never, ever have let her leave Brooklyn Heights.

Loki thinks it must be the first time he’s ever seen a grown man weep and felt something beyond irritation or disdain.

“You are showing him… how things could have gone worse for him?”

Loki genuinely wants to know, but perhaps it will also help the captain to hear what he is seeing and how.

HYDRA gets lucky against the ghost team; Schmidt has them killed to draw their missing leader out. He gets there in time to watch Gabe Jones give up the ghost. When he hears Stephanie screaming Bucky sees this will be the Red Skull’s final stand; when that scream ends abruptly he accepts that it will be his as well.

“Fears and nightmares. Let him try to stand against us, when he can barely resist his own mind.”

The next scene is a variant of one Loki has experienced already: the Red Skull looms over Stephanie Barnes in a lurching aircraft. In this version, her husband had already been subdued when she arrived.

“You will submit to me,” the Red Skull tells her.

“Or you will watch him die.”

“No,” Bucky shouts, straining against the custom-built fetters that keep him where he is. “Don’t you dare, you complete freakshow.”

Stephanie struggles in the monster’s unrelenting grip, but Schmidt is much stronger and they all know it.

“I don’t see that you have much authority here, Captain. Perhaps I speak inaccurately, in any case.”

The Red Skull smiles demonically at Stephanie.

“Possibly I mean you will submit to me, _and then_ you will watch him die.”

The captain in the vision roars with incoherent rage as his wife's tears begin to fall, but he is powerless for all the strength of his reaction. It sounds like Thor when Loki chose against him on the Bifrost. The captain in front of him is rapidly approaching catatonia. The blood on his lips, Loki realises, is there because Barnes has been biting down to keep himself from crying out. The man is pathetic, the son of Laufey tries to scoff. He could never be so brave himself, he thinks instead.

“This is for nothing,” the trickster snaps, letting the illusion dissolve. “He cannot give you information he does not possess.”

In fact James Barnes might not be able to tell anyone anything for some time yet. His jaw is locked to deny his captors the satisfaction of hearing his distress and his hands are so tightly clenched that it is possible his palms are bleeding too. He has been trembling from the cold almost as long as they have been here, but it seems more violent now.

“I do not need a detached Midgardian consciousness bleeding all over mine when he expires due to your clumsiness. Your Master will not congratulate you for damaging both of us beyond usefulness.”

The Other glares at him in tense, measuring silence, unwilling to be dismissed so sharply but much more afraid of Thanos than he is worried about pride. Loki, who has stared down his share of Aesir in his time, smirks as the Chitauri leader takes itself back to its hive.  

“Thanks,” the captain mumbles. Loki wonders if he has misunderstood.

“Do you  _thank_ me?”

Barnes manages a hoarse chuckle but nods seriously.

“Wouldn’t have liked where that last one was going.”

“You did not like the others either.”

James does not deny it. It looks like breathing is taking more energy than he has.

“Captain, I ...wish I had not had to do as he asked. If I could take it back I would.”

The wretched boy has the nerve to attempt a smirk. 

“The word you want is ‘sorry,’ pal.”

“Sorry, pal.”

Loki offers him a smirk of his own- purely to show him how it should be done, of course.

The captain’s surprise shows in his dimming eyes. Loki, who has no clear idea of how far Midgardian endurance can be pushed, remembers the first scene the boy was forced to face and feels something very like real fear for the captain and the girl who waits for him.

“You should keep your promises,” he says decisively. Barnes blinks warily, not quite catching on. He twitches, on his guard but not up to resisting, when Loki presses his palm against the captain’s chest and calls on power that feels more like his- Thor’s mother’s than his own. 

At the last second, practically on a whim, Loki sends the cube back with his erstwhile prisoner. He wonders if James and his friends will see it as a show of good faith or as another of the trickster’s traps.

For the first time in longer than he’s realised, Loki is alone with his thoughts. They are not quite as he remembers them. 

When his knees hit the floor all Bucky can think is that the room he’s in is much too bright. He blinks quickly, but his eyes are burning and his head is pounding and he can’t seem to make his lungs work right.

“Bucky!”

Her voice is every miracle. He is desperate like he has never been for her to be real, and really there.

“James, my James. Thank God. Take a breath, my love. Bucky Barnes, where the hell did you go?”

If he knew nothing else on earth he’d know her touch. Steph catches his face in her hands the way she does when her emotions run high, but she kisses his forehead instead of his lips, and then his cheeks. Bucky leans into her, gasping for air that finally feels warm enough to breathe without ripping right through his lungs, and lets her deal with the rest.

“Here,” his girl directs him, tugging gently. “You're not staying on the floor, a Shéamais.”

She keeps saying his name. He’s not sure where they’re going but he’ll always follow if it's Steph Rogers leading. There is a sick moment of mind-bending vertigo, which he doesn’t like at all, but then it’s smooth and warm and-

“Bed,” he mutters. He remembers that.

“That’s right.” 

“Stay,” he asks begs sobs. If she leaves him he’ll never know what’s true. If this turns out to be one of Loki’s tricks he doesn't think he'll survive.

“Of course. Bucky, I’m not going anywhere. Maybe ever again. God, you’re shaking. C’mere.”

“Stephanie,” he murmurs like a prayer- votive offering and thanksgiving, both at once. She wraps herself around him and lays her head on his chest. He’d like to touch her hair, but he can’t make anything move the way he wants. Her hand on his cheek feels more real than anything he has known in ages. If there can be ages in a place beyond time. Bucky begins to choke, trying to make any sense of it, but she distracts him with the quick, firm press of longed-for lips to his jaw, his neck, his shoulder.  

“I’ve got you, okay? I won’t let anyone hurt you. You’re safe now. Really and truly, a chéadsearc.”

If she says it then it must be so. Stephanie would never lie to him.

Sleep crept up on him between one uneven, hopeful breath and the next.

“Thank you my Christ for bringing this idiot home and soon,” Stephanie whispered as she stroked her husband’s pallid face with a shaking hand. It had only been a few hours for her- from after six to close to eleven, she guessed- but from the fading cuts on his palms, not to mention the state he'd turned up in, she knew it had been wildly different wherever Loki had taken him. 

“JARVIS,” she said softly.

“I need Tony down here now, please. If you could get us a doctor as well that’d be just grand. Thank you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't think we've done a mhuirnín yet, have we? it means 'my darling'


	4. I can't begin to tell you

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> post-Loki stress disorder begins to set in, Dr. Banner makes a much better second impression than his first, Clint ships it hardcore and Thor finally shows his face.

“I can’t believe you showed her the New Mexico footage. Were you _trying_ to upset her?”

It was hard to deny that Bruce Banner was an expert in the field of getting upset, but the others stood firm.

“Her partner’s alone with a madman she knows nothing about,” Tasha said tightly. “And he got there taking the fall for her. Of course she wants to know what he’s facing.”

Clint nodded fervently.

“And she’s SSR-trained, anyway- she’s used to that kind of briefing and worse.”

Tony shrugged when Bruce glanced his way expectantly.

“She would have lost it if we didn’t give her something to work with. I guess I figured- when HYDRA got hold of him my dad _drove her there_. So I gave her what she asked for and wished like hell I knew how to drive her anywhere near wherever the fuck they are.”

“Is she still conscious?”

“She is,” Natasha confirmed with a frown. “She barely reacted at all. It looks like shock to me. If we don’t get Captain Barnes back we’re going to have to-”

“Don’t,” Clint broke in with unusual fierceness considering it was Tasha he was speaking to.

“We’re not going to do that to her. We’ll find him.”

Stephanie Barnes had seemed to take the whole aliens-among-us thing entirely in stride, Tony told Bruce by way of keeping the peace between his teammates. She had also watched Loki’s Destroyer decimate a New Mexico town with barely a shudder, focusing her terse, penetrating questions on how the Asgardians came and went. She had studied Loki’s every appearance with tireless diligence, but all too soon realized what Clint had been trying to tell her from the beginning.

“We really have no clue how he does any of it, huh.”

“I’m sorry,” Tony had said softly. “Tasha’s got everyone who can help us trying to get a lock on Thor. Like I said, he’ll know the people who can tell us what to do.”

Steph had nodded once and murmured that if the others didn’t need her she thought she might go to bed. It was plainly obvious to all of them that she wasn’t even going to try to sleep, but there had been no reason on earth not to give her the space she obviously needed. After making her promise to say if she needed anything, Tony had walked her to the suite he had grown up thinking of as ‘Cap’s and Steph’s, for when we bring them home’ and said good night.

Heading back to the lab to check in with Bruce, he had found his friends locked in the argument that was still going on.

“I really don’t think that was appropriate,” Bruce grumbled, unconvinced. “It’s not even strictly relevant- we know Loki’s not using the Bifrost this time or he wouldn’t need the Tesseract in the first place.”

“Well, what would you have told her? ‘Sorry, we’ve got nothing, why don’t you go check out the Met while we wait for some aliens to find your missing husband. Don’t worry, the genocidal maniac who grabbed him right in front of you probably won’t screw him up too bad’?”

That was way too close to the reality of their situation; Clint fell silent, expression stricken. No one else spoke for a while.

“I have to call Reed back,” Tony muttered eventually. “Any word from the others?”

“I spoke to Dr. Selvig,” Tasha reported. “He’s briefing his team.” 

“Sir,” JARVIS interjected, sounding as excited as an AI could.

“The captain appears to have returned unexpectedly. Mrs. Barnes is asking for yourself and a doctor as soon as possible. Given Loki’s involvement, should I perhaps alert Dr. Strange instead of our medical contacts at SHIELD?”

Clint, who had jumped to his feet at the announcement, looked as worried as if his own infant had been hurt.

“Does he need a surgeon? Or a sorcerer? I really hate messing with Loki.”

“Preliminary scans suggest no surgical emergency, Agent Barton. The most pressing concern seems to be severe dehydration. Unfortunately, I cannot detect magical interference. However-”

“If it’s severe dehydration we don’t have time to wait for anyone else,” Bruce decided. “Don’t you keep half a pharmacy in here anyway?”

He was already making his selection with brisk authority, handing Clint supplies as if Hawkeye’s official designation was Registered Nurse.

“Assuming she’ll let me within ten feet of him,” Bruce continued, confidence suddenly faltering. Tasha shook her head with a small smile.

“She’d let Dr. Doom look after him if she thought he could help.”

“I dunno,” Tony said lightly. “They really didn’t seem keen on Viktor von Doom. Maybe they don’t like green, it was kind of a HYDRA color.”

“They won’t after Loki,” Clint muttered. He slapped Bruce’s shoulder with exaggerated bonhomie.

“It’ll be fine, Banner. Now she knows you’re not trying to clone or Nazi-fy her husband she’ll _probably_ let you help us stop Loki from killing him. Don’t worry, she likes Tash and me fine, we’ll put in a good word for you.”

“Yay,” Bruce said drily.

“Let’s not waste time he might not have,” Tasha urged them. “It’s not like any one of us lacks experience with rehydration therapy.”

It was a fair point, so Tony led the way towards his father’s friends without further discussion.

Tony’s team had been braced for anything from hysterical sobbing to an X-rated reunion scene, but when they arrived at the Barnes suite Stephanie was sitting peacefully, monitoring her husband's pulse with two fingers pressed firmly to his wrist as the captain lay very still next to her. She looked up with a careworn smile.

“Look who I found. Completely beat and shaking like a leaf but home by lights-out like a good soldier.”

JARVIS’s scans, as usual, were right on the money: Bruce was muttering under his breath as soon as he saw the younger man’s sunken eyes and dry, dry skin. Tasha, wondering the same thing as Tony, glared at the patient as if it was his fault his condition made no sense.

“Even with the serum this is extreme for half a day, isn’t it?”

“Half a day for us.”

Stephanie's free hand traced the ridge of her husband's brow bone.

“His eye’s back to normal. That takes three, four days.”

She was right, Tony realized: there was no trace at all of Bucky’s Hulk-won shiner.

“Three or four days without water.”

From the Black Widow, that was definitely real concern.

“Don't worry, we can handle this.”

Bruce looked every inch the confident medical doctor who had been saving lives in South Asia for the last several months until Stephanie lunged to stop him reaching for her husband.

“Wait, no. Don’t touch him.”

Dr. Banner flinched.

“Mrs. Barnes, I only want to help.”

“No,” she said in a softer voice, patting the doctor’s arm and trying to smile.

“No, I know that. I’m sorry, Doc. It's just- if you grab him like that he’ll come up swinging. Give us a minute?”

Tony wondered what it must be like to be so used to combat stress that it became a normal consideration in waking your own husband. The others watched in silent sympathy as Cap jolted into awareness, reaching for his wife before his eyes were completely open.

“Steph, what is it? What’s wrong?”

Even from his voice it was obvious that Bucky had been without water for too long. Steph bent close to her husband, explaining in the serum-whisper Howard had always spoken of as frustrating and romantic at the same time. She smiled when he began to relax, keeping her arm around him as he answered Bruce’s questions with his head on her shoulder.

“Nothing works right. Everything’s all heavy. ‘s weird.”

“You’re very dehydrated,” Bruce explained kindly. “We’re going to try an intravenous treatment, all right? You won’t believe how quickly you feel better once we get your fluids up.”

Bucky nodded- Tony didn’t think he was really following at all- but Stephanie looked disturbed.

“You want to give him blood for this?”

There was a confused silence until Clint, with his academically rigorous knowledge of the SSR’s wartime circumstances, parsed her question.

“They use IV treatments for all kinds of things now, not just blood transfusions. See these bags, right? They can be customized for what the patient needs. This is plain old fluid replenishment. Saline and stuff.”

Stephanie considered this for a moment, then nodded at Bruce as if giving official permission. Barnes barely reacted to the needle, but the man _was_ speaking rationally within an hour of his still-unexplained one-on-one visit with Loki so Tony figured different standards must apply. Bruce taped the needle securely into place.

“That’s good. Try to stay still as much as you can.”

Stephanie laughed wryly.

“I think we can manage that.”

Tony didn’t doubt it: as it was, the captain seemed to be staying upright mainly because Stephanie was more or less holding him in place. Bruce chuckled in acknowledgment and helped her ease their patient back against the pillows. Bucky mumbled something drowsily appreciative as his eyes slid shut again.

“Sir,” JARVIS interrupted again. This time, the poor thing sounded genuinely troubled.

“The Tesseract appears to have been returned to its case in the vault. Scans indicate condition normal. I have no explanation, sir.”

Every pair of eyes in the room swung towards the exhausted soldier on the bed, but Bruce shook his head adamantly.

“Let’s start by making sure it’s secure, okay? As long as Loki can’t get back in here there’s nothing we need from him tonight. Let the kid rest, for god’s sake. He can barely speak as it is.”

“Thank you, Dr. Banner.”

Tony, aware of the subtext, heard both the apology and the absolution in Stephanie’s concise response. Bruce’s answering smile was as genuinely at ease as he ever got.

“Have JARVIS to call me if you need anything. Any time. I’ll be right down the hall and probably awake- you know how these serums are.”

She smiled first at the doctor, and then at Tony and the others.

“Thanks. We’ll get the whole crazy story tomorrow, okay?”

“Don’t worry about that,” Tasha said more kindly than she usually spoke to new people.

“Our first concern is making sure Loki doesn’t try anything like that again. We’ve just about got hold of Thor. Your husband can speak to us when he’s ready.”

Stephanie looked deeply grateful, but also like she might pass out from the exertion of nodding at them.

“Good night,” Tony said for all of them, and they left the captain and his wife in peace.    

“Did you see him go from unconscious to protecting her in three seconds?”

Clint looked utterly star-struck.

“I ship it so hardcore, Tasha.”

“I know you do,” Tasha grumbled, half-glaring. “You’re worse than Coulson about this one thing.”

“Only because Coulson wants one for himself,” Tony pointed out. He wasn’t sure which side of the argument that observation put him on, but it was true.

Bruce sighed gustily, as though discussing Coulson’s creepy crush in the middle of the night was somehow unreasonable. It took mere minutes to establish that the Tesseract was, in fact, back in its secure container; deciding how that had come to be and what they should do about it proved the more strenuous task. Security footage revealed nothing- the cube was gone, and then it was back, and that was all JARVIS could tell them. Tasha glanced at her phone.

“Can we pursue this tomorrow? Dr. Foster is supposed to get in touch in the next ten minutes. That’s a higher priority, right?”

Bruce shrugged agreeably.

“I can take it up to the lab if we need someone to keep an eye on it. This isn’t even the weirdest thing that’s happened today, Tony.”

“Barely makes top three,” Clint agreed.

Tony decided there was no point in leading a team if he couldn’t respect the occasional consensus. At his nod, they went their separate ways.

* * *

 

Bucky woke up to the familiar sensation of his wife’s fingers pressed against his wrist as she presumably checked for continued signs of life, but also to a strange stinging in the hand she was holding. When he prised his eyes open, blinking stickily in the bright morning light, Stephanie was standing next to the bed, carefully freeing him from a set of plastic tubes and metal hooks that he didn’t really want to think about. For a brief moment he wondered if HYDRA- but no, Steph looked entirely at ease as she discarded the needle she had just extracted from his arm.

“What the hell is all that, then?”

“Saline drip,” she said as if he should know what that meant, turning to study his face. Bucky tried to be cooperative; Steph's smile was warm with affectionate relief.

“I guess it works, as well- you look so much better, a chéadsearc.”

She was still scared, though- it was clear in her face, but also in the way she couldn’t seem to let go of him. Bucky tugged on her hand and grinned when she clambered over him so they were lying as close together as they could be.

“Steph Rogers,” he said solemnly.

“You have no idea how much I missed you.”  

She smiled, touched but teasing.

“Did you really? Every minute and every second, my Bucky boy?”

Bucky hadn’t really been counting in minutes out there.

“Every breath, a ghrá mo chroí.”

“I love you,” Steph said as seriously as if it were the first time, then lowered her head so her cheek was flush against Bucky’s chest. One of her hands toyed with his hair while the other snaked around his waist. Bucky wrapped his arms around her, keeping her close, and waited for the question she seemed afraid to ask.

“Was it awful?”

 He swallowed, wishing he could spare her but knowing he wasn’t going to start lying to his wife.

“It was pretty grim, Steph.”

“Did it hurt?”

“Like hell.”

Her hand stilled against his neck.

“Worse than your arm?”

“I guess. No morphine out there, you know?”

No sleep either, no breaks, no hope- but there was no need to frighten her.

“Christ, James.”

“I know.”

Bucky rubbed his hands down Steph’s back in long, slow strokes that seemed to soothe both of them.

“How’d you get away?”

“I didn’t,” he admitted. “He just …let me go. I think it was because of you, kind of.”

Stephanie pushed herself up onto her elbows so she could look at him.

“How d’you figure that?”

“He said ‘you should keep your promises.’ He must have meant to you.”

“What the hell does Loki know about what you promise me?”

In spite of his resolution to carry on as if the whole insane episode had never happened, Bucky felt his joints lock as the memory of it crashed over him. Before he lost it entirely, Steph caught his face in her hands like she had the night before.

“I’m sorry! Of course you don’t want to talk about that. James, I’m sorry. I didn’t think, sweetheart.”

“It’s okay,” he muttered, closing his eyes for a moment. Of course it wasn’t her fault- how could she possibly know what to avoid if he couldn’t even martial his thoughts long enough to tell her anything?

“I’m fine, Stephanie.”

“You’re not,” she whispered.

“But you will be. James, we’re going to figure this out, okay?”

Steph didn’t object when Bucky kissed her hard instead of responding in words. It was entirely possible, he thought, that she knew it was the only answer he could give with any kind of confidence.

When they finally ventured out of the suite Tony insisted was theirs practically by birthright, they found their host sitting in the lounge with Banner and the two SHIELD agents Bucky hadn’t met yet.

“Captain Barnes,” the doctor who was also a serum monster said warmly, standing to greet them as Tony waved cheerfully. “You look well. May I?”

For the second time that morning, Bucky submitted to be checked over and then congratulated on his recovery. He thanked the doctor sincerely for his help, which seemed to fluster Banner as much as open aggression had the day before. Stephanie introduced Natasha Romanova and Clint Barton with professional congeniality- she was disposed to like them, Bucky saw, but hadn’t had the chance to make any kind of judgment yet. Tony was asking whether anyone else wanted more coffee when a crash of thunder, improbably close at hand, made half of them jump.

“Here we go,” Clint Barton grinned. “Brace yourselves, Vikings are coming.”

“He’s not a Viking,” Bruce objected. “They call themselves-”

“My friends!”

The man striding down the hall towards them was enormous even from the perspective of someone who’d spent the last couple of years with Gabe Jones within shouting distance- since the serum, Bucky had got used to feeling confident about his chances against much bigger guys, but this bona fide beefcake would have given him pause even on his best day. His outfit seemed to be modified chainmail of some kind- the Viking comparison seemed fair enough- and he had outlandishly long hair for a guy, thick and bright gold. Bucky shook his head, determinedly ignoring the chill that ran down his spine as Loki’s voice hissed _the son of the Allfather is no kin to me_ in the back of his mind.

“Is it true you have had the Cosmic Cube all this while?”

“Straight to business for once,” Tony muttered. “Hello to you too, Goldilocks. Nice to see you, thanks for keeping in touch, why the hell didn’t you tell us your dead brother was alive?”

The enormous blonde frowned.

“My Jane said you believed that was so. I assure you, Tony Stark, my brother was lost to us that day upon the Bifrost.”

“Sure,” Steph said unexpectedly. “But I guess we found him again, huh?”

“Not us,” Bucky muttered as some of the disjointed puzzle pieces he’d been handed in that broken nightmare of another world began to fit together.

“The Chitauri and their Master, whoever the hell that is.”

It was only when everyone turned to stare that Bucky realized he hadn’t actually mentioned any of that stuff to anyone yet.

“Thor,” Tony said into the silence.

“These two are James and Stephanie Barnes. Loki showed up for the Cube- I saw it go down myself, big guy, and I’d bet my armour it really was him- and tried to take the lady with him. Her husband wouldn’t have it- 1940s chivalry and all that, you two will probably get along great, now I think about it- so your brother took him instead; we’ve only just got him back on his feet.”

“Took him where, Stark?”

Tony, of course, had no answer. The blonde’s heavy gaze fell square on Bucky, who met his bright crystalline eyes with the simple assurance of having been right there with Thor’s god-forsaken so-called brother.

“‘Among the stars,’ he said. That’s what it looked like, anyway.”

“And what of _the Chitauri_ and this _Master_? Even if my brother had somehow survived- do you truly suggest that _Loki_ serves another?”

The not-Viking sounded offended at the thought. Bucky, remembering the look on the trickster’s face before he had brought those hellish _fears and nightmares_ to life, answered with more sympathy than he had intended to show.

“Didn’t seem like he had much say in it, boss.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think 'a ghrá mo chroí' has happened before? it's just layering one into another, he does it when he's feeling more emo than usual. this one is 'love of my heart', but it works with pretty much all of them as long as the sequence makes sense ('love of my heart' > 'heart of my love', for example)


	5. I saw stars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> some tales don't improve in the retelling. Names and handles are discussed; Thor and Bucky agree strategically. Steph still kind of wishes her husband's problems could be solved with the quick and judicious use of her pistols.

The captain’s account of his own abduction was admirably succinct, focused in that SSR way not on his experiences but on the tactical application of what he had learnt. Considering that Stephanie Barnes was already clutching her husband’s shoulder like she’d rather die than let go, Clint found it difficult to fault the man’s decision to gloss over the parts of his story involving mind control and psychic torture. Those poor kids, Clint thought, and immediately felt about eighty years old.

“The thing I don’t get,” he ventured, “Is why he let you go.”

“I don’t really get why he did any of it now he’s sent the damn thing back. All I know is he got all quiet, and then he apologized and did some hand-waving thing, and here I am. This whole scheme is way above my pay grade- I’ve been out of my depths since that stick turned into a blue and glowing mind-control bayonet-thing.”   

“I call bullshit on 'and then he apologized',” Tony cried, probably at least partly to give Stephanie a moment to recover. Cap threw Tony a grateful look as he snuck an arm around his wife.

“Back me up, Thor: Loki doesn’t apologise.”

“Even as a lad he only did so under duress, and then only rarely to anyone besides our mother.”

“It did look like it was hurting him,” the captain agreed with a smile. Thor looked torn between laughter and tears, which was really not that unusual when they were talking about Loki. Which, Clint thought sourly, they had been doing altogether too often in the last 24 hours.

“Good,” Stephanie muttered unexpectedly. Tony burst out laughing at the vindictive look on her face, but Bucky’s smile was soft as he kissed her cheek.

“Please don’t vow to shoot him ‘so many times’ now.”

Stephanie’s threatening scowl faltered as she fought a smile of her own.

“I should, though.”

Tasha caught Clint’s eye, distinctly approving. See, he tried to say with an answering wink, I told you they were the best.

“You’re not gonna fight him. You’re staying well clear of that lunatic. We’re all doing that, okay?”

Something about the way Bucky said it convinced his wife. Stephanie said nothing further, but pressed the hand she held between both of hers.

“Well said. With my brother that is sometimes the wisest course.”

The captain twitched as though his eyes were itching but did not respond to Thor’s endorsement except with a polite nod. Stephanie, noticing, let go of him to press the glass in front of them into his hand; Barnes sighed exaggeratedly but drank about half of it under his wife’s watchful eye and chuckled when she clapped condescendingly as he set it down again.

“Agent Coulson is here,” JARVIS announced abruptly. The Captain’s smile faded as Stephanie looked round at Tony accusingly.

“That joker who pulled the hospital stunt?”

Bruce glanced up ruefully as the dreaded beeping began again.

“Every time. I guess I’m out. Good luck, you guys.”

Bucky waved and Stephanie smiled sympathetically as the doctor made his retreat. Tony beamed- clearly Bruce had secured his spot in the Captain and Mrs. Captain’s good books. It might have helped that Tony had categorically banned his team from mentioning Erskine or his formula within earshot of “the serum sweethearts” again, so there could be no repeat of Steph’s unfortunate first encounter with poor Dr. Banner.

“Phil Coulson’s not so bad,” Tasha put in loyally. “He’s one of SHIELD’s top agents.”

Clint nodded, more in support of Tasha than Coulson.

“It's useful too," he offered. "He brings as much intel as he takes away when he shows up like this.”

“Does he do this a lot?”

Tony sighed and nodded at Steph.

“It’s part of the deal. SHIELD lets me run this team as I see fit, which means they don’t bother us as long as no one gets stepped on when we run into bigger threats than usual, but since we technically work for them they also exercise their right to check on us from time to time just in case I’m cloning their agents or something. Which I am not, Agent Agent, okay?”

“I’m aware,” Coulson said evenly, entering as soundlessly as ever. “Morning all. Captain Barnes, it’s an honour to meet you at last.”

“Sure, pal.”

Bucky Barnes could say a lot in very few words, Clint was beginning to realize; out of the corner of his eye he saw that Tasha was looking smirky and appreciative again. If Coulson hadn't been standing right there he'd probably have kissed her. Stephanie nudged her husband reproachfully, smiling at Phil.

“Sorry. He’s very tired. He means ‘hi’. I’m Stephanie.”

“Oh, I know. I watched you while you were sleeping.”

Tasha winced as the captain narrowed his eyes.

“I mean, uh, I was present. When you were unconscious. Because of the-“

“They already know you oversaw their recovery,” Clint burst out. Awesome as it would be to see Bucky Barnes in action, he did like Phil Coulson more than nearly any handler he’d ever had. Tony glared, disappointed, but Coulson hurried on with grateful relief.

“I heard about your run-in with Loki. You look good, considering.”

“Thanks,” the Captain muttered, still awkward but not quite hostile. Agent Coulson soldiered on.

“Has Stark invited you to join the Champions Initiative yet?”

“‘The Champions Initiative?’ Is that this team?”

“Yeah,” Stark sighed. “They’ve never said why exactly, but officially that’s what this outfit’s called.”

Natasha shrugged.

“I assume we’re supposed to be championing their cause. Barton wanted S.W.O.R.D.- Stark, Widow, Odinson, …ARcher, Dr. Banner.”

Steph looked skeptical, but Bucky offered Clint his hand with a wide smile.

“SWORD and SHIELD, huh? I like it. How come the rest of you didn’t go for that?”

“Because if they wanted any sort of consistency SWORD would be SROBB,” Steph complained. Coulson wiped the besotted look off his face as the captain raised an unforgiving eyebrow in his direction.

Clint grinned; Natasha sighed deeply.

“I do like it better than ‘Tony and the Starkettes,’” she conceded. It wasn't exactly enthusiastic, but with Tasha Romanova you had to take what you were offered.

“That must have been your idea,” Bucky said to Thor, eyes wide and expression innocent. Thor looked flummoxed for a moment, then gave a booming laugh and slapped Bucky’s shoulder hard enough to make him grab for Steph, who caught his arm in time to steady him. Tony pouted but got no sympathy. Coulson glanced between the Captain and his wife with the air of a pilgrim reaching his long-sought destination, but Stephanie looked at Natasha with concern.

“Is your handle Widow? Isn’t that …sad?”

“It’s ‘Black Widow,’” Tasha explained.

“Don’t worry- I’ve never been married.”

The captain grinned at her, then glanced at Tony.

“Iron Man and Black Widow. Do you all have code names?”

“Mine's Hawkeye,” Clint supplied. Stephanie blinked, glancing uncertainly at her husband.

“Did he say ‘hot guy’?”

It really wasn’t flattering how hard Natasha laughed at that.

“It's Hawkeye,” Coulson clarified, perhaps trying to repay Clint’s favour from earlier. “Because he’s a marksman, you see? Like ‘eagle-eyed’ but easier to say.”

Thor glowed with pleasure.

“And I am the mighty Thor,” he finished grandly. “Son of Odin, Prince of Asgard, and wielder of Mjølnir.”

“That enough titles for one guy?”

“Sometimes I am also called the Thunderer,” Thor told Bucky without a trace of irony.

“Good for you, pal.”

Steph choked on a giggle as she elbowed her husband; he pulled her all the way into his lap with a grin as Thor smiled magnanimously, taking no offence. Bucky turned to Tony again as Steph made herself comfortable.

“Does Doc Banner have one of these? He said ‘the Other Guy’ before. That doesn't seem very official.”

Coulson did his best to hide his discomfort as Tony explained in a low, annoyed voice that Dr. Banner wasn’t an officially recognized member of the team because SHIELD had a standing order to arrest the Hulk- as the Other Guy called himself- on sight.

“It sucks, right, and we all know it sucks, but that's the way the cookie crumbles, as they say. Whoever they are. Bakers, or something. Government service, government shit- but you two know that better than most people.”

“Ain’t that the truth,” Captain Barnes groused. Coulson deflated so visibly that Thor patted his shoulder consolingly. It only sounded a little like Phil might need traction to recover.

“Not that we don’t love it when you come hang with us,” Tony said after a moment.

“But did you come here specifically to admire-slash-freak-out my friends or do we have to talk shop at some point?”

Agent Coulson had, in fact, come at Nick Fury’s behest: the mood sobered quickly as Phil reported that the director had sent him not only to ensure that the Champions had come out of their Loki adventure unscathed but also to secure ‘the Tesseract’ and return to HQ with it.

“Are we still talking about the damn cube?”  

Coulson confirmed that they were. To save the captain going over everything for what would presumably have been the third time that morning, Tony and Steph did their best to give Phil a complete picture. Bucky listened carefully throughout, offering comments and corrections from time to time. Tasha was right, Clint thought- there was something unnatural about the couple’s carefully-maintained calm. Not shock, though- to Clint’s eyes, at least, it looked a lot more like an uncomfortable degree of resignation. Agent Coulson, in contrast, looked about as unsettled as Phil ever did.

“Can you prove any of this?”

Stephanie glared.

“Would you take the trouble to _make up_ something like this?”

Coulson looked torn between duty and devotion, but he stuck to his guns and defended corporate policy. In brief, he explained, decisions concerning national security could not be made on the basis of oral evidence alone. Without hard facts, even the most complete first-person account could only become the basis for opening an investigation, not for taking action on the scale that would be required if a tenth-part of the Captain’s story could be verified.

“So, what, you’ll believe me if I bring you an alien, but not before that? How’s that gonna work? Does the disappearing-reappearing Cube not count for anything?”

It did, Phil conceded, but only towards proving Loki’s continued activity. Thor, who had only reluctantly accepted that part of the story, glowered but said nothing. Tony looked thoughtful.

“You said you could see whole constellations, right? If I bring up a star map could you show us roughly where you were?”

The Captain shrugged.

“I can try. What would that prove?”

“Reed Richards will be involved in the next bit,” Stephanie predicted. Tony grinned.

“All the points to Mrs. Barnes! If we can narrow the field some Reed will be able to check for unexpected activity, energy, sentient life forms- all that good stuff. He probably won’t bring us an alien, but he’ll find them.”

The couple Barnes nodded as one.

“Alright.” Tony was on the verge of rubbing his hands together with glee as black-out curtains Clint hadn’t realized could be lowered in the lounge wiped out every trace of the morning light.

“Let’s do this thing. Everybody ready?”

The Captain and his wife had separated just enough for her to sit on the sofa instead of her husband; it was Thor, always eager to experience "Stark's mechanical wonders," who gestured for Tony to proceed.

“Alright, JARVIS. Take us into Hyperspace.”

The trouble with Tony Stark, Clint thought, was that it was so hard to hate him for being a smug bastard when he pulled off tricks like this. The room was suddenly illuminated with tiny, vivid pinpricks of light, breathtaking in their intensity. Tony manipulated the display from his tablet, openly preening at his teammates' looks of awe.

“You cold, hon?”

“Naw, I’m good.”

Clint glanced over to find Stephanie rubbing her husband’s arm as though trying to warm it.

“You’re shivering, though.”

“I’m okay, Steph.”

Tony, at least, was prepared to take the Captain’s word for it- he began to enlarge different clusters of stars, elaborating on what and where they were and trying to show Bucky how to recognize useful non-land-marks so they could give Richards enough to work with. Tony’s questions and suggestions came even faster than Thor’s had, as was often the case when he got excited about some new theory or gadget.

“Hold, Stark.”

It was so rare that Thor, of all people, interrupted one of Tony’s demonstrations- much less in that tone of urgent command- that they all paused to check on him. Thor himself was fine, but he indicated the Captain and his wife with a jerk of his head.

“Can this be Loki’s doing? The boy is not well.”

He certainly didn’t look it. Bucky’s eyes were wide and glassy, his posture rigid- he flinched violently at Loki’s name. All Clint’s experience said not to touch a person in the grip of a flashback, but before he could say anything to that effect Stephanie leaned into her husband instead of stumbling out of his reach.

“You’re fine,” she said clearly. “Talk to me, a rún.”

“It was freezing out there,” he whispered, toneless yet terrified. “Couldn’t ever get warm without you.”

As no fewer than three survivors of PTSD looked on in trepidation, Stephanie broke every rule they’d ever been given so she could throw her arms around her husband’s neck and cling.

“I’m right here. Bucky, I swear to God I won’t let go.”

That seemed to mean something specific- Cap’s shoulders relaxed slightly as he closed his eyes, letting his wife settle him against her as she kept up a barely audible chant of reassurances close to his ear. When the Captain opened his eyes again, though-

“Get the lights,” Clint barked. “Stark, it’s the visuals that are freaking him out.”

Tony bent over the console without a word- almost at once the room was bathed in the bright white of 21st Century halogen lights. Stephanie huffed in relieved exasperation.

“You don’t have to blind us to make up the difference, Ant’ny.”

“Steph,” her husband murmured, pulling away slightly so he could look at her.

“You okay?”

“Fine. Are you back with us? You know where we are?”

They did have their version of this routine, Clint saw with both relief and devastation on their behalves.

“2012. Stark’s big old house on Central Park. None of that was real, it’s a…star map? We’re trying to find the place so Stark’s pal Richards can tell us I’m not crazy.”

Catching repetitive movement in his peripheral vision, Clint glanced up to see both Tony and Coulson, totally engrossed, nodding encouragingly. Stephanie smiled warmly.

“That’s exactly right. Except no one thinks you’re crazy, Bucky. I mean, crazier than we already knew.”

A tiny smile animated his still-bloodless lips.

“Thank you, a chroí.”

“No,” Stephanie protested. “Don’t you dare thank me, you stupid boy.”

Watching the wretched captain return her embrace with all his strength was a near-physical relief. Clint wasn’t the only one who thought so, either: Tony smiled, sinking back into his chair as Coulson breathed out slowly; Thor stood by in silent sobriety that was not at all his usual style. Tasha’s hand even brushed Clint’s for a second- from anyone else it would have been an accidental touch, but it was more than they usually risked in front of SHIELD eyes.

After a moment, Bucky nodded decisively, mostly to himself, and tore his gaze away from his wife so he could check in with Tony.

“Sorry. I guess I’m not too hot on star maps. Should we try again?”

Stephanie, suddenly every inch Agent Barnes the SSR operative rather than Steph the adoring nursemaid, looked prepared to stop that from happening whether she had to assassinate Coulson, JARVIS or Loki himself to ensure it. Tony, however, shook his head at once. There were many other ways to narrow the search, he explained- they just took longer and looked less spectacular. It was a mark of how serious things were that Tony accepted Coulson’s offer to make sure SHIELD’s resources were at the Champions’ disposal without once pointing out that Stark Industries had supplied more than half of those resources.

“It would probably be best if I took the Tesseract back to SHIELD in the meantime.”

“Not that again. Are you not following this conversation?”

Captain Barnes was back, Clint thought with a guilty rush of anticipation- there was no trace of the helpless panic from only moments earlier in the commander’s hard-edged demand.

“That thing is a doorway, right? And I’m tellin’ you there are people tryin’a get in who we definitely don’t want here. Why the hell should you have your men going all out to keep the thing closed and guarded when, for once, we can move the whole damn door?”

“Captain Barnes, the Tesseract is-“

“It’s dangerous, that’s what it is. And a near complete mystery- you barely know more than we do, it sounds like. No. The big guy’s gonna take it back to daddy, and if Loki wants it as much as all that he can take it up with people who have some idea what that means.”

And there it was, Clint thought- that right there was the Captain America voice, if there had ever been such a thing. Cap himself seemed to realize this, because he glanced apologetically at Tony.

“If that’s okay with you, I mean, sorry. I know this is your team. And your blue and glowing nuisance, kind of.”

“No,” Tony muttered, looking startlingly close to bashful for Tony Stark. “No, go ahead. Every word of that was better than what I would have said. I say take it, Thor, by all means- as Barnes has spoken so mote it be.”

Coulson still seemed uncertain.

“Stark, are you sure?”

When Tony gestured for Cap to finish what he’d started, Bucky did so with a sardonic look that made Tony’s trademark smirk seem like a Broadway starlet’s winning grin.

“It’s not that complex, boss. All I’m sayin’ is if you don’t like the show you shouldn’t ask for an encore.”

“Amen,” his wife said quietly. Coulson adjusted his cufflinks the way he only did when he was very nervous, but he made no move to stop Thor from gathering up the Tesseract and its protective casing. They all trooped outside to witness his admittedly spectacular departure.

“I will return directly,” Thor promised them, meaning he would be back as soon as Odin allowed it so he could participate in Loki Watch on behalf of the Aesir. The cube which had been at the centre of events was tucked securely- if slightly anticlimactically- in one of his huge hands as Mjølnir hung, as ever, in the other. Thor offered Bucky a bright, genuinely warm smile.

“Asgard is grateful to you, Captain Barnes. I hope you will be much recovered when we meet again.”

And then he was gone in the usual shower of bright light and intense colour. Clint turned to see how Steph and Bucky were reacting to their first Bifrost encounter and blinked in surprise as Stephanie began to laugh, not quite happily.

“Asgard is grateful,” she snorted, fixing her husband’s collar even though Clint was pretty sure there hadn’t been anything wrong with it. Her voice was threaded with something Clint hadn’t heard from her before, but it made Bucky draw closer protectively.

“Their bloody trickster nearly killed you- hurt you bad enough to give you nightmares when you’re not even asleep. Lousy SHIELD won’t say what the hell they want from us but they’ll let you make decisions on behalf of the whole planet, best we can figure. Nothing in this century makes one lick of sense, a chéadsearc, but it’s okay, isn’t it, it’s all fine, because at least the _aliens on Asgard_ are god-damned grateful that we don’t want their god-forsaken blue and glowing cube thing.”

The precious gems on Steph’s engagement ring shone like the stars from Tony’s demonstration as she rested her hands on his shoulders. The poor girl could not have looked more exhausted if she had actually been unconscious.

“I don’t understand what we need to do so people will just  _leave you alone_.”

Her husband slid both of his hands into her hair, cradling her face.

“A ghrá geal, I promise I’ll be fine.”

“I hate ‘you will,’” she grumbled, sulking. “I want you to be fine  _now_.”

But apparently they weren’t far enough off the scale of unrealistically adorable reactions to real life yet, because Cap chose that moment to bend his wife very gently backwards as he kissed her, taking his time to show her that it wasn’t all bad news with him. Neither of them seemed disturbed by the presence of a four-person audience trying for all they were worth not to stare openly. After a moment, Tasha huffed in amusement and headed back into the house. One hard look from her later, Coulson followed with only mild reluctance. Tony and Clint shared a disbelieving, delighted smile before they too retreated, leaving James and Stephanie Barnes safe in each other's arms on the lawn of their best friend’s family home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a rún means 'my secret.' I think Steph uses it metaphorically, like 'my secret thing' in the sense of secreted away rather than because she thinks anyone has failed to notice.
> 
> also, in case anyone is wondering why I am happily pointing out that Steph breaks all the rules and then letting it all work out anyway- these flashbacks work differently because I reckon that both combat shock itself and the subsequent re-experiencing thereof must be different when you have perfect recall, but on top of that there is a whole magical element to this so it's going to be a little more ??? than it would be if Bucky were reliving WWII drama. that's my reasoning, anyway.


	6. things to come

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> progress with SHIELD, two new liaisons for two new Champions, 21st Century friendships and foreign food, and the rule of Marvel (anything joyful is always followed by a swift kick to the head)

“They were very insistent, sir.”

Nick Fury was perilously close to rolling his eye.

“You’ve been working with Tony Stark for four years already. You know better than I do that the man only has two settings: ‘I insist’ and ‘I did it before you got here’.”

But it hadn’t been Stark taking the hard-lined stance on things- it had been James Barnes, fresh from a flashback that could not have been more convincing. It might not have been proof in the way that SHIELD’s tactical division understood hard evidence, but no one who had seen what Phil had could doubt that the Captain had been among the constellations Stark had laid out for him and had not enjoyed it one bit.

“He was telling the truth.”

“I know you believe that. Hell, I even believe he believes that. But if it really was Loki then Barnes could have been anywhere from Stark’s basement to backstage of _The Lion King_  and still have seen whatever the guy wanted him to see, couldn’t he?”

The trickster’s illusions were never tactile, though, and Barnes had specifically recalled the cold. That too had been a truly organic response, Coulson was sure- the captain hadn’t realized he was reacting until Stephanie had noticed.

“Agent Coulson, I hope you’re not suggesting that I tell the WSC that SHIELD’s elite response team let someone take an unlimited power supply off-planet without a fight because some kid who’s been frozen in ice for 70 years got the shivers.”

“It’s Asgardian tech, as far as we know. It was the Asgardians’ representative who remanded it. Tell them Stark finally read a diplomatic packet all the way through and toed the government line for once.”

Fury snorted.

“I’d have more luck with the alien abduction story.”

Coulson said nothing when Fury turned back to his papers, effectively dismissing Phil, but he also remained seated in front of the desk instead of taking himself silently away. The second time he adjusted his cufflinks, first the left and then the right, the director paused with his notes still in hand.

“Well? Spit it out.”

“I think it’s time.”

Seeing Nick Fury look truly taken aback was a rare pleasure.

“It doesn’t look that way on paper.”

On paper, Coulson pointed out, the Champions’ Initiative was a four-man operation led by one of the most notoriously unreliable personalities in the United States and rounded out by a circus-trained trick shooter, an ex-Soviet assassin with a past so checkered that even she wasn’t always sure which of her cover stories came closest to the truth, and an alien with a lightning-conducting hammer made of solid rock. Once one embraced the Mighty Thor as a fact of lived reality, Phil was coming to believe, it became much harder to place much stock in whether things made sense in theory.

Fury sighed.

“Can you look me in the eye and say it has nothing to do with wanting to see your childhood heroes back in the field?”

He could. It wasn’t that, Coulson assured Fury- or not just that.

“They’re ready. All of them.”

Fury stared out at the city skyline for so long that Coulson was beginning to wonder whether it was another dismissal when his boss finally spoke again.

“Have you selected their liaison officers?”

Coulson had done that before medical had been anywhere close to reviving the Captain and Stephanie, but he was beginning to see that it wasn’t always advantageous to reveal that level of preparedness.

“I’ll contact Stark about scheduling the introductions.”

* * *

“And here in the gym, we have the pride and joy of my collection! Oh, and Hawkeye.”

Agent Barton flipped Stark off without turning around.

“Can’t harsh my buzz, Iron Ass. Romanova’s fighting James Barnes hand-to-hand and they’re letting us watch. I’m not sure whether I’ve had this dream or read this fic.”

Agent Carter wasn’t entirely convinced she was still living in reality either, but she wouldn’t have called it a dream.

“Can it, both of you,” the woman next to Barton snapped. “He’s too easily distracted as it is. Will you watch your left, idiot, you can't still be forgetting you have two arms.”

“Don’t take it personally,” Stark advised Sharon and her partner cheerfully. The captain had only just returned to training, he explained, and his wife wasn’t quite ready to risk his health at Agent Romanova’s hands without offering her particular blend of advice, encouragement and straightforward abuse. Sharon and the other designated liaison, Sam Wilson, watched in spellbound silence as Erskine’s super-soldier and Lukin’s latter-day experiment went at it in a no-holds-barred fight that was as spectacular for its sheer speed as for its intricacy and variety. Romanova came very close to besting the captain more than once, but endurance ultimately won out over agility and Romanova begged off with a scowl. The Captain grinned at her as he offered his opponent a hand up.

“Sorry, Tasha. God, you’re quick. Nearly got me with that scissor thing.”

“Believe it,” Natasha smiled, recovering already. “Rematch tomorrow or do geriatrics need a longer recovery period?”

Sharon glanced at Stark questioningly- very few people earned the privilege of addressing Agent Romanova so familiarly, let alone being teased instead of outright insulted. As far as she knew Barnes and his wife had only known Stark's team for three weeks.

“Mind Control Club’s very exclusive,” Stark shrugged. Neither Barnes nor Romanova seemed to have heard him, but Stephanie flinched and Hawkeye glared reproachfully. Realising his mistake, Iron Man gave Mrs. Barnes a sheepish grin.

“Sorry, Mrs. Cap.”

“What’s he done now?”

Captain Barnes, who had come up behind them, accepted the bottle his wife thrust at him but continued glowering at Stark with mock severity until Stephanie nudged her husband in the direction of Tony’s guests with a grin. 

“Same old tune. Come meet these two! Remember JARVIS showed us their files? Agent Wilson’s the one with the wings.”

Sam shook Stephanie’s hand and then her husband’s, answering their enthusiasm with his own as he told them shyly that he'd grown up hearing about their SSR team.

“First integrated unit in the US Army, you know? Of course you know. But it meant a lot, even when my dad was out in Vietnam.”

It didn’t seem like they did know- Stephanie glanced at Barton for a translation as her husband looked to Stark. Once they understood, James Barnes made Sam’s day in just two sentences- he was glad to have been helpful, he said thoughtfully, but integration hadn’t really been any kind of consideration. They’d picked the best they knew and taken those people just as they were, and Jones and Morita had been among the best men he'd ever known. His wife nodded fiercely. After Sam promised firmly to tell his father so at the next available opportunity, Stark turned to Sharon with a wry grin.

“And this is Sharon Carter! You can guess why Coulson thought we needed one of these.”

This time the Captain and his wife understood immediately, but Sharon didn’t think they had any more idea what to make of it than she had when Agent Coulson had told her in a voice heavy with deeper significance that Barnes and Barnes had always seemed to be at their best with Stark and Carter to complete the set. Hawkeye shook his head.

“Sometimes I think he thinks we're Pokémon.”

“So many things in this century have very stupid names,” Stephanie Barnes complained. Dr. Banner snorted with laughter, waving a greeting when Captain Barnes jerked in surprise as if suddenly noticing the doctor was there.

“Oh no,” the captain moaned. “Banner in the gym means we have to go do the thing with the charts again.”

His wife turned to him, her attitude protective.

“What's the problem?”

“Nothing like that,” Banner assured her much more mildly than Sharon had been led to expect from the man who played host to the Hulk.

“Your husband doesn’t appreciate Tony’s iTunes mix.”

Stephanie raised an inquiring eyebrow.

“He’s going to make us listen to that Satan-worship band again,” Captain Barnes said desolately. “They’re so loud, Steph.”

There was a beat of silence, then the team reacted all at once. Stark wailed in outrage on behalf of Black Sabbath while Agent Barton burst out laughing; the Black Widow patted Dr. Banner’s back in pre-emptive commiseration. At the centre of the unfolding chaos, Stephanie Barnes kissed her husband’s cheek and promised to break him out of the terrible science dungeon before Stark’s taste in music permanently damaged the captain’s brain.

Sam turned to Sharon with the happiest smile she’d ever seen on his face.

“I think this'll be the most insane thing we’ve done with SHIELD yet.”

This, Sharon thought despairingly, from a man who regularly jumped off a helicarrier on mechanical wings.

But then Banner was already herding Stark and his father’s best friend towards the lab with an air of one already martyred, and Mrs. Barnes was watching with interest as Barton and Romanova disagreed vehemently about whether they should introduce “the 40s kids” to Japanese or Thai food first.  Sharon began to see why Jasper Sitwell had laughed so hard when she’d told him about her new assignment. She shook her head at Sam with a huff that could yet grow into a sigh.

“And we haven’t even met Thor yet.”

* * *

When Stephanie checked in on the eggheads and their mostly-willing captive as promised, she found Bucky bent over a series of astronomical charts and graphs with a frown of concentration creasing his brow. Bruce was tracking Bucky’s comments and suggestions on a giant screen, asking clarifying questions in his measured way. Tony moved back and forth between him and Bucky, keying data into one of his many handheld devices . Steph tried to follow their conversation for a bit but soon decided she’d be more helpful trying to find Loki by watching for him at the window. She came up behind her husband, leaning her forearms on his shoulders as she peered at down his work before grinning at the other two.

“Is my soldier still in detention or can I spring him for lunch? Clint says we’re going to eat Japanese raw fish. You guys want in?”

They didn’t- Tony muttered something about visual simulations, looking the very picture of guilt until Bucky rolled his eyes and reminded him that he could talk about star maps without ruining his day. Bucky didn’t seem sure he wanted to be sprung if raw fish was a condition of his release, but Tony assured him that Hawkeye would relent and find him a cheeseburger the very second Cap complained that cold sliced sea creatures reminded him of Loki. Perhaps because Steph’s husband was reliably more adventurous than he thought he was, or because he couldn’t bring himself to manipulate a guy who was already prepared to do pretty much anything to win a grin from him, Bucky sighed long-sufferingly but declared that if the whole of Japan could live with raw fish as a lifestyle choice he’d probably survive one meal. Tony grinned, looking unbearably like Howard had the first time he’d stood over them with caviar and smoked oysters, and reminded Steph to take photos with her phone- with her phone- so he and Bruce could share in the experience.

It turned out that Sam and Sharon had to go back to SHIELD for a follow-up meeting with the famous Agent Coulson- to confirm that neither wanted to quit in dismay now they’d met the Champions, Clint speculated- so it was just the four of them who ventured out to Natasha’s “nice little sushi bar around the corner.”

“Double date,” Steph said absently, not sure whether she was remembering Gary Richards and his girl Aggie or trying not to think about them. It was only when Natasha’s gaze sharpened while Clint glanced away that she realized the other couple had thought they were being subtle.

“Date with two chaperones,” Bucky grinned when Steph darted a panicked look his way. “We’ve had a lot of those, somehow.”

With the easy charm that had made him Sarah Miller’s stand-in bartender of choice as soon as Bucky was old enough, Steph’s husband offered their friends a series of short, sharply funny anecdotes about some of their friends and well-wishers over the years. He looked to Steph for details from time to time, leaving her room to take over if she wanted to, but listening to him was its own particular pleasure so she mostly let him tell it his way. It was such a gift, she thought ruefully, that they even had friends for her boy to entertain.

When Agent Romanova had discovered them huddled in the lounge after one of Bucky’s more traumatic post-Loki episodes, she had dropped into the chair across from them and related a devastating story about Soviet mind-control serums that sounded so insane it had to be true. In a halting, devastated voice Steph never wanted to hear again, Bucky had murmured that it hadn’t been like that at all, with him, and then told them more about what it had been like than his wife thought he could have brought himself to speak of without Natasha's prompting. It had taken Steph hours to soothe her shaken sweetheart into sleep afterwards, let alone to find it herself, but knowing what Bucky was dealing with had made so many things so much easier that Steph knew she’d always be grateful. She wasn't sure she could have been friends with Natasha under normal circumstances, but since no part of the last few years had been anything like normal Steph was prepared to just go with it. It helped that Natasha and Bucky were very quickly turning out to be kindred spirits, and that Steph was coming to suspect that she and Clint Barton would soon be fast friends as well. The archer was shrewd, savvy and sarcastic in all the right ways, but he was also one of the sweetest guys Steph had ever met. He was also a giant dork, Tony warned them, but whatever that meant it had yet to affect their relationship adversely. Apparently they weren’t supposed to talk about the fact that he and Tasha were obviously making time, though. Steph tried to look innocent when Bucky caught her eye, but knew from the way his eyes narrowed and his lips quirked that she hadn’t quite erased her knowing smirk in time.

They ended up quite liking the Japanese raw fish, but with a couple of clear exceptions. Steph refused to so much as try the orange gunge Natasha introduced as sea urchin, though Bucky seemed to find it worth the risk; in contrast, the face her James made when the smiling chef dished up fresh octopus tentacles had Steph wondering if he was going to plead Loki and skip out on them after all. Instead, he limited his reaction to declining politely all four times Natasha showed her affection by solicitously offering him a piece. As a source of long-term stress, Steph supposed, the little bright purple suckers on the long white strips of almost-meat could hardly compete with HYDRA internment camps or dangling off a train heading for the mountains at full speed.

Clint laughed apologetically, mistaking the cause of her quickly repressed shudder, and ordered a basket of delicious, delicately deep-fried shrimp as though to make up for the octopus. Bucky’s glance was more searching, but when Steph squeezed his hand and shook her head he let it go without comment. The only other tiny hiccup came with the check. When Bucky reached for his wallet, Natasha shook her head and insisted that it was her treat. Steph, who had known they were in over their heads around the time they had been offered separate beer, wine, and sake lists, felt her cheeks heat at the implication that Tony’s charity kids couldn’t manage without his team looking after them at every turn. Sensing an oncoming scowl, Bucky kissed her cheek before grinning at their self-appointed host.

“Thanks. Next time’s on us, okay?”

Clint’s surprise registered on his face as Natasha’s fingers closed around his wrist on the high counter between the two couples.

“If it’s a real date I want to go somewhere I can wear a dress and heels. Barton and I are taking you to cocktails before or after- Employees Only is going to love you two.”

“Don’t worry,” Bucky said to his wife in a joking undertone. “I don’t think she's gonna make you wear heels too.”

“I might anyway,” Steph mused at the same private pitch. “If you make it worth my while to impress you. Cocktails before dinner, maybe- I think you're busy after.”

And of course it wasn’t a competition, and of course she wasn’t keeping score, but Stephanie had always been an artist by temperament. It couldn’t be her fault, could it, if she saw at once and with satisfaction that her James wore ‘startled and smitten’ at least as well in 2012 as he ever had, and certainly better than the still red-faced Agent Barton.

When Natasha’s phone rang, all four of them sighed in resignation.

“Let me guess,” Natasha said instead of ‘hello,’ answering on speaker so they could all lean in to listen. “They’ve found Loki.”

She had meant on the charts, Steph thought, but it was more immediate than that. In fact Loki had found them, Sam Wilson reported in the voice of a new recruit who had not expected to face action so soon: he had turned up with as little explanation as Bucky had, and in much worse shape. Doc Banner was doing the best he could to remedy heat exhaustion in a patient whose species he wasn’t fully competent to identify, let alone treat, and the so-called god of mischief was more or less recovering, more or less unconscious, under the more or less hostile combined gaze of Iron Man, Agent Thirteen and Dr. Banner.

“He wants to see Captain Barnes. The only thing he’d say was that he’d done Cap wrong and has to make amends.”

When Bucky spoke it, was with the steely professionalism of Captain Barnes reporting for duty whether Steph’s James was ready or not.

“Does he know how long we have?”

The other two looked up with expressions that matched Sam’s confused query over the phone. Steph, who knew how her husband’s mind worked, closed her eyes and leaned into him, determined not to cry.

“They wanted him to find them the Cube. He did that, but then he sent it back when he was feelin’ bad about messing me over or whatever that was. Now he's in trouble, and he wants to fix things by coming here. So I say he thinks they’re coming after him and that bloody Cube. We need to know how long we have, if he can tell us that, and whether there’s anything at all to do except wait for it to start.”

They’d already done this, Steph wanted to protest as the rest of Stark’s team absorbed the implications of Bucky’s matter-of-fact summary. They had already been asked to give everything they had to win a war they weren’t prepared to fight. How could once not be enough?

“We’d better go,” Clint- Agent Barton, Hawkeye- muttered reluctantly. The Captain’s wife nodded with the façade of serenity that had worked well whenever Steph had had to watch from a distant ledge as Bucky did some impossible thing or another with only her rifle between him and whoever was out to get him that day. She had one precious thing left, Stephanie thought as the thing in question caught her hand as if he couldn’t walk without holding onto his wife. This time she wasn’t going to give him up- not for America, not for New York, not for Brooklyn Heights. Not again.


	7. good luck to the girl who loves a soldier

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steph is cross with everyone, Bucky doesn't like armour or cannons, and Loki's brain is like a bag of cats.

Stephanie was rigid with tension by the time they were within shouting distance of Banner’s lab. Bucky caught Clint’s eye, grabbing Steph’s hand to slow her progress as soon as Barton nodded. When they were alone, he tugged his wife into a quick embrace.

“It’s gonna be okay, a chroí.”

Steph sighed softly, not wholly convinced.

“You really think he’s here to ‘make amends’?”

Bucky had no idea- until he'd found himself back in his wife's arms he'd been pretty sure he was going to die out there. Loki had seemed to think so too, he thought- until he hadn’t. Who knew what could move a man like that to change his mind so completely, or how long that change would last?

“Dunno. Might not make that much difference, you know.”

Steph’s scepticism eased into intrigue as Bucky went on: from almost any point of view, he argued, it was better for them to know where Loki was than be glancing over their shoulders every two minutes. If the guy was lying- or insane- then they’d be no worse off than they already were, feeling their way around in the dark at a snail’s pace- which they could continue to do, after all, so even if they were being played for fools they’d have lost no time. If Loki had decided he liked them after all, though, Bucky thought a lot of things would go much more smoothly with the cooperation of someone who knew more than he did about what they were even gearing up for.

“But you do think we’re gearing up for something.”

“Yeah, Steph.”

She reached up to kiss him firmly on the lips. She looked so tired it made Bucky want to hit something- not that that would help his worn-out sweetheart get any rest.

“I hope these guys know how goddamn lucky they are to have you here for this, Captain.”

“Not just me,” he muttered, awkward as ever in the face of her admiration.

“Steph, you know it’s all because of you.”

She did- or at least that Bucky thought so- but they didn't need to have that conversation again. Neither of them said anything until Steph kissed him again- that chaste press of her lips that was such pure, almost childlike affection that it often made Bucky feel like he was ten years old again and playing at being married to his own sweet Steph. The Steph in question shook her head as she pulled away.

“They’re all waiting for us. C'mon, let's go see whether your new pal is crazy or evil.”

“Or both,” Bucky reminded her, and grinned when she glared at him. They entered the lab still holding hands, and found Clint and Tasha in the two-seater on the one side of the lab while Banner kept an eye on Loki, who was also flanked by Carter and Wilson on one side and a fully armored Tony on the other. It would have been a pretty funny tableau, probably, if every face in the room hadn't been tense with hostility.

Bucky had expected to greet Loki with anger, maybe, or with fear, if not the reluctant sympathy he associated with watching the German prisoners of war they had sometimes had to oversee. Instead, he found himself speaking with such casual familiarity that even Steph did a tiny double take.

“You look like you got run over by a truck. Aren’t you supposed to be headin’ that army instead of runnin’ from it?”

The others obviously expected Loki to retaliate- Carter winced, Wilson stiffened, and Banner closed his eyes tight- but the creature who had once been hailed as a god only inclined his head in silent acknowledgment. He’d been more than unwell; his eyes were sunken, his face pale except where it was flushed as though with fever, and his movements were far less graceful and deliberate than Bucky remembered.

“That army was a reward for goods I chose not to deliver.”

“They didn’t think much of that stunt with the cube.”

“Not as such."

It really was that simple, if Loki was to be believed: he'd sent the Cube back with Bucky, the Chitauri had found out and put their ally-turned-captive halfway through the wringer before he'd got away. 

"So what d'you expect us to do about it?"

That was Steph, her lovely eyes as cold as Bucky had ever seen them.

"I had thought- if you will give me the Cube, perhaps I may restore it to them before they come after it."

Bucky shook his head, wondering if this next disaster really was going to come down to a pair of snap decisions. 

"We don't have it anymore, boss." 

Loki looked like he had been expecting that.

"That is why Thor is not among you."

Bucky nodded; they would never have handed it over even if they'd had it, but there was no need to get into that. Loki looked wry. 

"I suppose I cannot blame you. Odin will not see the Cube taken from Asgard again. Captain, you must believe I did not intend to bring this upon your people."

In fact he had intended exactly that, but Bucky was beginning to see that the Loki who was addressing him today might not be the one he remembered. He asked his next question- which was mostly a statement- for the benefit of Stark's team. 

"'This' being an invasion." 

Steph straightened up perceptibly as Loki confirmed it- once more over the top, her mask of calm said too clearly. Bucky slipped his arm around her and then turned to Tony. 

"I'm gonna guess this isn't hard evidence either, but you see why we have to start talking about who and how and where?"

Sam Wilson stared at Bucky for a long moment before turning warily to Iron Man.

“I could swear he's saying he thinks we should help Loki fight an alien army. This isn’t another combat stress thing, is it?”

Tony narrowed his eyes speculatively.

“Cap, are you being mind-controlled again?”

Stephanie stopped trying to incinerate Loki with her eyes long enough to roll them instead.

“What exactly d’you think he’d say if he were, Ant’ny?”

Tony waved his arms, stymied by the use of actual logic. The bright hospital-grade lights made his armour all the more spectacular as he raised them. 

All Bucky knew for sure was that blue light and metal armour could not be good news together. The choked-off scream that had been the beginning of his life as Captain Barnes warred with the smell of burning flesh, and of trees being turned to ash around them. Men cried out in shock and pain; trees crashed down at random intervals while others went up in smoke. Bucky glanced over to check on Matt Jackson and felt his blood chill when he found Steph watching him instead. He grabbed her before he knew what he was doing, thrusting her behind him in the vain hope that she would stay put long enough for him to get her clear.  

“Stay back. Those things took Winslow out before we knew what they were.”

Instead of getting out of the way or even trying to shoot the bastard as would always be her first instinct, Steph grasped Bucky’s shoulder. She spoke very calmly.

“They didn’t. He’s not HYDRA, Bucky, it’s just that light. They call him Iron Man in this get-up, but it’s still our Tony. Tony James, remember?”

“Shit.”

The HYDRA gunner raised his weaponised arms to his own head and yanked his helmet off, revealing a dark-haired older guy. Howard’s eyes, Bucky thought distractedly, and Howard’s hair, kind of. Not really.

“Cap, I’m sorry, I-”

“Stark,” Bucky blurted, hating the catch in his voice. Not our Stark, he managed not to say out loud. Not our New York.

“Howard’s boy. Two thousand twelve. Sorry, ignore me- I’m just losin’ my mind again.”

“You’re not,” Steph assured him with the combination of determination and desperation Bucky knew well from years of rubbing her back and promising that being unable to breathe was just a minor setback in the greater scheme of things.

“Come sit. You’re fine, a chéadsearc.”

It wasn't a lie, exactly- more like a con they were in on together. One day repeating it wouldn’t be enough to make it true, of course, but if that vast and violent war hadn’t been their end, to say nothing of the loss of _everyone they knew_ , Bucky was pretty sure he and Steph could withstand these echoes of the living nightmare he had just about survived.

“I’m okay,” he agreed, turning to kiss Steph’s cheek in a not-quite-gruff ‘thank you’. When he raised his head again, Loki had taken a few lurching steps closer, looking at least as shaken as Banner or Stark behind him.

"Captain, what is this?”

Before Bucky could think of answering, Steph slid off her chair to stand between him and Loki with her Colt already raised.

“If you mess with him again I’ll kill you myself. I don’t know how yet, but I’ll figure it out if I have to.”

“She’ll have help,” Hawkeye warned Loki, but the trickster focused on the Stephanie, surprisingly distressed at her sustained hostility. 

“It is to _prevent_ harm that I have come here.”

“That's okay then,” Steph shot back. “If you say so it _must_ be true. It's not like you've lied to anyone before, or killed hundreds of people or anything.”

"Steph-"

"Shut up," she snapped. "You don't know anything, you get hit in the face too often to make your own decisions. God, I have to go shoot something. You come find me if you need me, all right?" 

She kissed his cheek before she left; unusually, Bucky suspected, the others were completely silent as they watched her go. 

"Decision time," Tony declared, calling them back to order. "What do people think?" 

"I think I agree with Stephanie," Clint offered. "It sounds crazy, but it would be crazier to make this up." 

“It’s Loki, though.” Banner shrugged. “His brain is like a bag of cats on a good day.”

“What, unhygienic and problematic for PETA? Yeah, I can see that.”

“Yes, Stark, that is obviously exactly what he meant.”

Bruce grinned at Sharon Carter.

“I’m just saying there doesn’t have to be a point, with him. Crazy, crazier, how do we even measure that with the guy who nearly destroyed a town just to aggravate his brother?”

Wilson huffed.

“He was definitely making a point that time.”

Loki glowered at the room in general.

“You are all aware that I can hear you.”

“Yes," Tasha answered for the team.

It was like watching the Clary kids tearing into each other, Bucky thought, if the skinny, freckled boys from 4B had been an engineering mogul in red and gold armour, his hand-picked operatives and an alien who could bring nightmares to life. Which, actually-

“He can show you,” Bucky blurted. “I’ve been asleep in my own head, I dunno how this took so long. You don't have to trust him. You don’t have to trust me. He can show you, and your Richards can get everything he needs in two minutes.”

“Cap,” Tony said cautiously, “Nothing you’ve ever said makes me think I’d want to let Loki go all Vulc-”

“Do you really think I’d suggest that?”

Bucky looked over at Loki, who was watching him with interest.

“You wanna show them… New Mexico, maybe? Something they’ve seen before. Just a couple minutes, please.”

The desert sun shone overhead, merciless except that they couldn't feel its heat. The shopfronts around them were covered with a fine layer of reddish dust, and the ground was blurred by sand set in motion by an arid wind they couldn't feel. Carter bit back a gasp- Loki let the illusion fade into empty air as Thor crashed onto the scene.

“Pure projection,” Banner muttered. “Visually accurate, totally intangible. This is how you saw your memories?”

Bucky nodded tightly and looked to Loki.

“You can do that with …where we were, right?”

Loki was confident that he could. From Tony's enlightened grin, Bucky thought he was beginning to see how much faster things would progress if they could compare star charts directly instead of fussing with maps and graphs.

“SHIELD will never take Loki’s word for this,” Sharon Carter warned them. Bruce shook his head.

“We’re not taking Loki’s word for anything. We’re getting Reed something to work with and then using his work to get SHIELD to take Cap’s word for it.”  

“Mm,” Clint grinned. "Fresh bureaucracy, very ripe! Get it while it’s hot.”

Bucky wished Steph had stuck around just for the look on Loki's face.

“Alright,” Tony said after a moment. “I say we start with this and talk again when Reed finds a way to tell whether we're making progress or all going crazy from proximity to this asshole. Objections?”

There were none- no one looked comfortable with the decision, exactly, but there just wasn't a better option. 

"I should go," Bucky muttered, imagining Steph sobbing her way through her pistol drills. It was only when he looked up that he remembered that going after her would mean leaving Loki with a bunch of people with whom he had a history of nothing but violent antagonism, and that the people in question were the only ones left he felt anything for apart from Steph. 

"Unless I should stay." 

Natasha steered him towards the door with a firm grip on his elbow.

“We’ve got this. You two look after each other.”  

Bucky waited for Tony to nod before meeting Loki's eyes.

“They’re taking a chance on us. Don’t waste that, all right? These are all the people in the world I have left to care about.”

“Except the one you run to.”

Bucky's smile was razor-tipped.

“Sure, but you don’t need me to tell you how it will go for you if you try anything with her.”

“Even Thor would not need telling twice. I give you my word, Captain. On the love of the one who should have been my mother.”

The only way they’d ever know if that meant a damn thing was if someone bothered to hold Loki to his word instead of second-guessing everything he said, so Bucky nodded again, threw Tasha one last grateful smile and left Stark's team to decide where to house their not-quite-welcome guest.

Stephanie hadn't headed for the firing range after all, JARVIS reported- Bucky found her in their room, staring vacantly at the city that wasn't quite their home. She didn't look up when he came in, or even when he slipped his arms around her waist, but she did sag against him as soon as she could.

“I thought you were dead, you know."

It wasn't the most promising opener Bucky had ever heard, but he kissed her cheek in greeting anyway and braced himself for the rest.

"When he dragged me off?"

"Didn't let myself think, that time. I mean on that helicarrier, when they wouldn’t tell me anything. Everyone was looking at me with that, you know, the hospital face?”

Bucky knew the hospital face. In hindsight he thought the SHIELD agents had probably been panicking about how to tell Stephanie she was waking up in 2012, but he knew he’d have reached the same conclusions she had if anyone had turned to him with anxious pity in their eyes when all he’d wanted was to see her. He nodded.

“I kept waiting for someone to say it: your James is gone, Stephanie; good luck finding a way to live without him because he’d be so mad at you if you didn't after everything he did to get you here. God, Bucky, I would have lost my mind doin' any part of this without you.”

“I’m right here,” her James protested, not even touching the question of what she thought he wanted from her as his widow.

“Yeah, but for how long? I know how much you love the sacrifice play, James Barnes.”

“The what, now? That Last Supper-Crucifixion thing they do around Good Friday?”

Steph laughed fondly, smacking his arm in annoyance and then hanging onto it like she’d never let him go.

“That’s a passion play, you jerk. Sacrifice play, you know- lay down on the wire so the other guys can crawl over you. Jump on the grenade, send your men back to safety but stay with the boys in front. Go after Schmidt all on your own, let Loki take you God knows where and then agree to help him without even thinkin' twice about it. Volunteer for crazy medical experiments because of your shady backdoor deals with Howard Stark instead of to get your own damn arm back.”

“You think I don’t know you asked your Doc Scherer to put in a word with Stark for me before he even talked to you about that crazy experiment?”

She smiled sheepishly, but kept at him in her indefatigable Steph-saving-someone way.

“I know it’s just who you are, James, and I love you for it, of course I do, but-”

Suddenly she turned in his arms and crushed her face against his chest as her arms wrapped around his shoulders.

"If you leave me here alone I don’t know what I’ll do.”

This was familiar ground too- in fact it was a thought that had tormented him nearly his entire life. Bucky had been seven the first time he’d really understood that Steph didn’t get sick like other kids got sick but more like her da got sick, that time he’d _died of it_. He shook his head, not that she could see that, and crossed his arms over her back as he told her what he’d always tried to tell himself.

“No. We’re not gonna go there, okay? Never does anyone one bit of good, Steph. We’ll take it as it comes, same as always. You and me, together or leave us the hell alone, right?”

She nodded, then pressed her face into his neck and sighed deeply against the collar of his shirt.

“Let me take you back to Middagh," Bucky suggested.

"Just you and me for a bit, huh? Not one tin-plated Stark for miles around.”

Steph looked sorely tempted, but she shook her head dutifully.

“We can’t just leave.”

But they could, Bucky countered. He and Steph had nothing to do with the team’s immediate plans, and there wasn’t much anyone could do until the map stuff had been dealt with in any case. The others were just serving as a security detail, really, and even if Bucky hadn’t been inclined to trust the guy- if only provisionally - he was pretty sure that Natasha Romanova alone could keep an entire company in line if she had to. They were all just waiting- for Richards, for SHIELD, for Thor, for the god-damned Chitauri to show their collective face. No one was going to care whether they did that in Brooklyn instead of way uptown.

“Won’t the others want you to be here? You’re the only one Loki even looks at.”

“Only 'cos he's scared of you already. Woman, you better not be saying you think I’d pick these jokers over my own best gal. He says he'll be good- I figure we can't know if he means it unless we let him try, you know? Téimis abhaile, a Mháire.”

“Okay,” Stephanie smiled at last. “Yeah. Let’s go home.”

She was waiting for him to take her hand, probably, but Bucky surprised her by sweeping her into his arms. He’d given Steph time to wave him off, but she tightened her arms around his shoulders gamely, locking her wrists where they crossed and studying his face with affectionate curiosity.

“Who am I supposed to be, baby-girl Hannigan?”

The last time Bucky had seen Sophie Hannigan, she’d been three years old and beside herself with glee because Steph had drawn her a new set of paper dolls, each with green eyes and deep auburn hair “just like me, Bucky, see!” That little girl would be in her 70s now, Bucky realised helplessly, those copper curls faded to steel. He pressed his lips to his wife’s temple and tried not to think about anything except her soft, smooth skin, her still-bright hair, her precious heart still beating close to his. 

“Hush. A guy's gotta take care of his girl, don't he?"

Steph closed her eyes with a contented sigh as her cheek touched his shoulder. 

"You're still such a sap, Buck."

Bucky kissed her ear.

“Only for you. You wanna take the bike or will we hijack one of Stark’s fancy cars?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Téimis abhaile: let's go home  
> a Mháire is the vocative of Maire (like how a Shéamais is the vocative of Seamus)  
> that is all for now from the VISIT IRELAND campaign that is this fic thank you for GO TO DUBLIN DO IT NOW reading


	8. I heard you screamin'

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> SHIELD should just stop trying to help, Loki proves unexpectedly competent, and Bucky needs a week off, or a month, or a couple years.

They didn’t even come close to making it back to Middagh Street. They were less than halfway down the hall, Steph still clutched tight in Bucky’s arms and teasing him mercilessly about doing ridiculous things for his own entertainment, when JARVIS announced “Agent Rumlow, Sir, with a sizeable section of the STRIKE team.”

Tony, out of armour now, opened his front door and scowled as he came face to face with a whole hoarde of guys with guns.

“What fresh hell is this? I haven’t found twenty new people; what does Coulson think we need with any of you?”

Bucky set Steph gently on her feet as the rest of Tony’s team began to filter in, presumably alerted by JARVIS. Dr. Banner, of course, was safely out of sight- looking after himself, but maybe also keeping an eye on Loki? Steph wondered fleetingly which of them would be in more danger.

“Mr. Stark. We’re here to help you out with your alien infestation.”

Rumlow and his agents spread out without acknowledging Tony’s quip that the problem they were having was a _lack_ of identifiable aliens. They were searching the room, but if Steph knew anything about Loki it was that he knew how to stay out of sight when it suited him.

“Contain him,” Rumlow ordered. Stephanie didn’t fully understand that 'him' meant 'Bucky' until someone grabbed her arm and steered her out of the way as her husband was abruptly surrounded by the heavily-armed STRIKE guys. He let them back him up away from the others with a wary, resigned kind of sigh.

“Haven’t we done this before? I’m pretty sure I'm not an alien.”

“Don’t engage; he could be compromised.”

Bucky winced as some overzealous idiot jabbed him with his gun. Steph turned a blazing look on Rumlow, but Clint asked her question before she got there.

“What the fuck are your people doing?”

“Didn't I just tell Stark? We’re here for Loki.”

“That’s not him,” Steph said coldly. "That's my husband, who was a Captain in the US Army."

“Captain Barnes is a known accomplice of the target.”

“ _Accomplice_? What the hell have you been-”

“Stay calm,” Tasha advised her urgently, suddenly at her elbow.  “If he thinks you’re in trouble too he’s not going to hold back.”

“He’s not fighting,” Tony muttered worriedly. “He’s barely staying on his feet.”

That made no sense at all. Steph turned around in alarm to see that Tony was right: Bucky was pale and shaking for the second time in six hours. They should have climbed out a window at the first sign of G-men, Steph thought bitterly.  

“James, a thaisce- let me go, god damn you.”

She wrenched free of the agent holding her back, but there were about three others between her and the heavily armed men now glancing uncertainly between their commander and his increasingly unthreatening quarry.

“Rumlow, for god’s sake, make them let her through.”

Sam Wilson was good people, Steph decided. His colleague showed no sign of relenting.

“I can’t let you risk it.”

It felt like having asthma again: Steph struggled for the words to express how completely she was not asking permission. The others weren't having any more luck: Clint was shouting at someone who seemed to have no idea what he was saying and Natasha looked like she was inches away from reaching for a knife. Help, in the end, came from the last person any of them would have chosen to trust. The SHIELD contingent reacted with horror as Loki materialised in their midst. Tony’s team froze as well when their alleged ally grabbed the captain’s shoulder, but Loki only held on long enough to get Bucky’s attention.

“Captain. Try to remain calm.”

“Get out of here,” Bucky muttered. He sounded much more lucid than Steph had expected.

“You have to go, ‘s gonna get hot in a minute.”

The smile Loki offered was closer to gentle than Steph would have guessed he knew how to be.

“I will endure. You must stay in control. These fools are not competent enough to be a threat to you.”

Bucky blinked sluggishly, processing the words.

“You’re saying it’s not like it looks.”

“No.”

“We've done this before too. It’s…a memory?"

“And hardly a memory, at that. It never happened. Fears and nightmares. You know this.”

“Fears and nightmares,” Bucky nodded as if to convince himself.

“You see,” Rumlow muttered. “Loki _is_ controlling him.”

“Don’t be stupid,” Tony snapped. “They’re just talking- it would have gone exactly the same if you’d let Stephanie through, except we’d be five minutes of this point ahead by now.”

Stephanie's husband glanced up at her name, his gaze dark with anger and something much worse than that. Loki spoke quietly, even reassuringly- Steph thought he looked concerned, but that could have been her own feelings bleeding over everything she saw. She started forward again, but Rumlow grabbed her wrist and yanked her roughly backwards.

 “We can’t be sure he isn’t dangerous.”

Loki snarled in frustration while half of Stark’s team protested loudly, but Steph missed everything they might have said because Bucky was collapsing on himself in mute horror, eyes fixed on her hand in the agent’s stubborn grip.  

“What the hell is wrong with you?”

“He’s obviously unstable, Stark."

“He is obviously in distress," Loki corrected Rumlow. “If it is instability you fear you should be much more concerned with-”

Somehow, two elite response teams and a guy who had grown up with Thor completely missed the gathering storm- the Prince of Asgard barrelled onto the scene with scarcely more warning than they’d had with Loki.

“Trickster,” he growled, and tackled Bucky’s only available source of stability right through the row of SHIELD agents between Steph and Bucky before Loki could so much as duck. Giving up entirely on other people, Stephanie elbowed the jerk still gripping her arm in the gut and flung herself through the gap that had opened up.

“A Shéamais, tá mé anseo. Tá tú slan, a thaisce. Tá mé anseo leat.”

He opened his arms to her without question as she slid to her knees to be on a level with him.

“Stephanín. Tá bron orm, a Mháire.”

She tangled one hand in his hair the way she often did, tracing hopefully-calming patterns down his back with the other.

“Hush. You don’t ever have to be sorry.”

Bucky had to know that- he’d only said it to her about once a month for the better part of their whole life- but his face twisted in self-loathing like Steph had only ever seen right before the ice.

“No. I should have-”

“Should have nothing,” she interrupted, more unnerved than she wanted to acknowledge by the way he was heaving, and by the fact that she still had no idea what he was thinking. Normally she would have placed the incident well before now.

“You could not be doing better than this. We just need to calm you down. You wanna take a breath for me?"

She tried to smile as Bucky gasped obediently.

“That’s good, see? You’re okay. God knows we know this drill. It can't last forever, J- we just have to wait it out.”

Bucky let her rearrange him until he was lying half-curled around her, head in her lap and one hand fisted in her skirt. Steph’s eyes burned as she combed her fingers through her husband’s sweat-slick hair.

“Stay with me, my honey.”

Bucky pressed his face into Steph’s thigh with a shattered moan as another wave of tension left him seized with misery all over again.

“My poor sweet girl, god. Christ, Stephanie.”

This dry-eyed devastation was new- it wasn’t even a flashback anymore, but his reaction in real time to whatever it was that had never happened. Fears and nightmares, Steph realised with sudden clarity- Loki really was the only one who had the least idea what Bucky was thinking. She glanced up to find him already watching her intently- he nodded slightly, but Thor jerked him roughly back into position when he started forward. Loki turned on his brother with an urgency that looked a lot like bloodlust the way he wore it. 

“She does not understand.”

Stephanie looked at Thor beseechingly- he seemed to realise she was ready to beg if she had to, because he nodded reluctantly. Loki flicked his fingers at once. The rest of the room went still in befuddlement which turned quickly to horror as the trickster provided the scene, projected like a film onto the far wall. Apparently Loki had learnt _some_ consideration- he’d placed his image so that Bucky couldn’t possibly get caught up in the visuals whichever way he turned.

Steph could have lived her whole life without seeing that bloody plane again. There was a startled murmur as the erstwhile head of HYDRA grinned, triumphant in a way Steph had definitely never seen him in real life. Sharon Carter put one hand over her mouth in wordless horror as Johann Schmidt grabbed a windswept, frightened Steph by both wrists and threw her to the ground while her husband struggled vainly against nasty-looking restraints that- thank God- had never been at their enemies’ disposal. The look on Schmidt's face was calculating more than lustful, but if anyone on God’s earth had ever seriously considered that kind of assault purely for strategic merit it would have been the Red Skull. Stephanie closed her eyes, fighting tears for the second time in minutes. It wasn’t fair that a monster so many years dead should still have any power over her poor brave boy. And if they’d made it so real for him that Loki felt he had to remind him they weren’t real memories-

“James. I promise it didn’t happen like that, a rún. Goddamn freakshow never so much as learnt my name, right?”

Steph bent to kiss his brow, helping him sit up with her when he caught her shoulder with a trembling hand. She kept her arms around him afterwards, not quite ready to let go. 

“Some crazy soldier put his best knife through the bastard’s hand for thinking the thought. Nailed him right to the panelling and then pounded on him like he was waiting for the guy to cry 'uncle' or something.”

Bucky’s lips turned up a little in recognition.

“He really never touched you.”

Steph pressed her forehead to his, making sure Bucky didn't look away.

“There is not one guy who’s ever touched me except my husband who loves me, all right? Bucky, you know that punk would die before he hurt me.”

Finally, finally, he started to relax.

“You’re sure you're okay.”

“Safe as houses, a thaisce.”

Mostly because of you, she didn’t have to say. She was still hanging onto him when Bucky tensed again.

“Still with us, Cap?”

Of course the inescapable Agent Rumlow was looming over them already.

“No thanks to you,” Steph muttered bitterly, but both she and Bucky nodded.

“Great. Look, I’m sorry, but you two need to come with us.”

“There is _no way_ you’re serious.”

“As a heart attack, Stark. We have her refusing to cooperate, obstructing an arrest, attacking my officers-“

“Who were manhandling her when all she wanted was to talk her husband through goddamn PTSD, you assholes. Seriously, Stephanie, you two have the worst luck with SHIELD.”

Tony looked so livid that Steph thought he might ‘hulk out' even without exposure to gamma radiation. Rumlow, however, seemed unaffected.

“Don’t make me arrest you too. You heard him encouraging the criminal to leave the scene. If you knew he’s been harbouring Loki you’re party to this as well, you know.”

“To what, exactly? You’re talking about Captain Am-”

“I’m talking about knowingly cooperating with a mass murderer. Mrs. Barnes, if you could-”

“Don’t,” Bucky warned; his voice was deadly calm, his grip on the pistol that was suddenly in his hand as steady as ever. Steph only realised how he’d even got hold of a gun when she caught Clint grinning at Natasha, who had the other half of her pair of firearms firmly in her own hand. Rumlow took a grudging step back, but his voice was patronising in the extreme as he held one hand out.

“Come on, kid. We both know you’re not going to shoot me.”

“If you try to cuff either one of them after what we saw _I_ will shoot you,” Natasha said coolly; Clint stood by her with his bow at the ready.

“Stark-”

“Don’t look at me,” Tony scowled. “If I had a gun I'd be pointing it at you too. What are you going to do, arrest all of us?”

Rumlow looked like he was seriously considering it.

“You don’t have to use those,” Steph said, aiming for conciliatory. "The cuffs or the guns. Or the bow."

They couldn’t let SHIELD –or Thor- drag Loki off; too many of their plans contingent on his cooperation now. Over and above that, though, Loki could have escaped several times over in the chaos that had been the last- ten minutes? Four years? Perhaps it was too much to hope that he meant to continue standing by them, but it was as Bucky had suggested earlier- if he did, they couldn’t very well abandon their new ally, and if he didn’t then he must have another reason for wanting to go where SHIELD was leading him and it would be plainly stupid to turn their backs on him. Steph figured they might as well let SHIELD think they were calling the shots if it made things move faster.

“You want us to come in, we’ll come in. We’re not hiding anything.”

“Except Loki,” someone muttered; every member of Stark's team scowled at the SHIELD newcomers. Bucky, either catching on or trusting Steph's instincts on faith alone, lowered Natasha’s gun, but his still-wary stance promised trouble for anyone who put a foot wrong. Rumlow shot Tony a challenging look.

“Does that go for the rest of your team? I know _you’re_ not going to go into shock if we have to cuff you, Stark.”

“Rumlow reads _The National Enquirer_ ,” Clint informed everyone.

“Please,” Tony retorted cheerfully,“That photo was in all the broadsheets too.”

They followed the others through the door, Thor walking behind them with Loki still firmly in his grasp. Steph bit back a laugh at Bucky’s scornful look when they were coralled into a single van- there was absolutely no way the SSR would have let them all ride together like that.

“Never been arrested by Americans before,” Bucky murmured.

“Thor has,” Loki reported as if that knowledge was among his greatest pleasures in life. It turned out that Clint had too- and Tasha, and Tony. Sam and Sharon, as befitted official liaisons, insisted that neither of them had been arrested by anyone at all.

“Buncha delinquents,” Steph sighed, settling into the crook of Bucky’s arm partly because it was comfortable and partly to make sure he'd stopped shaking.

“For these meatballs we crashed a plane into the ice. God bless America. Next time anyone starts something we should go to the pictures and wait for the dumb saps to knock each other out.”

There was a short, startled silence, then Bucky laughed and kissed her neck.

“You’re such a class act most of the time, everyone forgets you didn’t grow up on Park Avenue. Your Agent-C used to do it all the time.”

They sat in silence for a little bit, Steph watching Bucky alternate between keeping an eye on the others and looking out almost cautiously at the strange skyscrapers that stood between them and the city they’d known so well. When her eyes wandered for a moment, she found Loki watching them again. He seemed surprised when she nodded at him- not friendly, but more polite than she’d thought she might ever want to be.

Thank you, Steph mouthed, and not even reluctantly: he _had_ come through for her boy when no one else could. Loki’s tentative smile seemed more real than any of the choreographed reactions she had seen when he was performing for Stark’s team. Before Steph could be sure she hadn’t imagined the whole exchange, the trickster’s wicked grin was back.

“I have to say,” he remarked, “This team is much more colourful than I had understood from our previous meetings. I had assumed you must all be dullards, to be so enthused with Thor's company.”

“Can it,” Bucky ordered before Thor could reply; his glare was piercing but without heat.

“No one on this planet or either one of yours has ever _had_ to say something like that. Are you really baiting the lightning guy inside a metal box? Call yourself a goddamn mastermind.”

It was hard to say who was most taken aback when Loki subsided with only a grin and a shrug, but Thor was still darting curious glances at Bucky when the van pulled up at SHIELD’s head office.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> even more Irish, but this time pretty self-explanatory:   
> tá mé anseo (leat)- I'm here (with you)  
>  tá tú slan- you're fine   
> tá bron orm- I'm sorry


	9. swingin' on a star

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony does the unthinkable (well, everyone's thought it before, but this time he does it), Reed Richards finally gets some face time, and Bucky would really like to stop being right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, right? It lives! Sorry I've been gone for ages- my offline life has been taking up an unreasonable amount of every day, and what little I had left went almost entirely towards watching Germany finally, finally, win the World Cup. but they've done that, now, and work is kind of chilling out if not exactly slowing down, so I'm back and will hopefully soon be back on schedule! yay hooray?

“-the hell do you mean, you might have to shut down _this_ team? Your crazy Hulkbusters burst into my house and rough up my family heirlooms and _we’re_ the ones in trouble? Maybe I'll just pick them up and get the hell out of here.”

The heirlooms themselves were safely out of earshot for the time being. To no one’s surprise, the Captain and Mrs. Barnes would not hear of handing Loki over to a bunch of SHIELD guys they didn’t know from Adam after he had taken their side against the STRIKE team. The fact that Thor seemed determined never to let his brother out of his sight as long as they both lived hadn't done much to reassure them, and after a tense stare-off Tony had pointed out drily that four eyes against one wasn’t really fair, and that the couple were neither SHIELD operatives nor members of his team. Fury, possibly deciding that he had enough to deal with without the youngest geriatrics in America deciding he was one of the villains in the sorry saga that was their entanglement with SHIELD, gave them verbal clearance to go with Thor and Loki while Tony and his team were being debriefed. At a look from Coulson, Tasha had followed without a word; she slipped back into the boardroom just as Fury finally saw fit to raise his voice.

 “Sit down, Stark. We all know you’re not going to quit.”

“Do we? From where I'm standing it looks like I just did.”

Iron Man had threatened to walk out on SHIELD before, but Clint had never heard Tony use his Stark Industries Boardroom Voice for it before.

“You know what,” he said before he had fully processed what he was about to do.

“I think I’m out too.”

If he hadn’t just quit the only job he’d ever actually wanted partly on impulse and partly out of solidarity, Clint would have paused to glory in his own magnificence: he had rendered Nick Fury, Phil Coulson and _Tony Stark_ speechless with a single phrase. That had to be some kind of record. Tony, of course, was the first to find his tongue.

“You don’t have to do this, Hawkbutt. I’ll still let you see the kids on weekends-  you can be the cool dad, make me look bad by letting them stay up late and break all the weekday rules.”

“Like you’d be the strict one. What, you don’t want an extra long-range guy now your antiques are out of storage? You still need me- those two can’t fly a plane for shit.”

An expression of pure, unguarded gratitude crossed Tony’s face before disappearing behind the sardonic grin that was Stark’s preferred mode on SHIELD premises. 

“Good man, Barton. Come on, let’s go get the- I’m going to tell Steph you called her an antique. I hope she kicks your ass.”

Clint suppressed a slightly guilty wince when Phil started forward. Even though he was less than a decade older, Coulson managed to look very fatherly in his concern.

“Agent Barton, you can’t seriously want to-”

“I only let you bring me in so I could be sure I was one of the good guys this time.”

He didn’t have to say anything else- they’d all seen Coulson’s horrified reaction to JARVIS’s footage of Rumlow and his team, and Clint knew how strongly Phil must disagree with a lot of what Fury had said since- most of all the too-political admission that SHIELD could not continue to support Stark and his team as long as they insisted on siding with a known enemy of the state over SHIELD operatives. This break couldn’t change that stalemate- Clint knew Tony realised they weren’t going to be allowed to take Loki with them- but it was as unambiguous a move as Clint could think of with which to register that they did still insist on exactly that. Phil subsided with a grudging kind of nod. After a moment, Fury nodded as well; as usual, his expression gave nothing away. Clint steeled himself for major disappointment, then turned to Tasha with his cockiest grin.

“You’re coming too, right?”

And he had known what she was going to say, hadn’t he, but it still felt like a kick in the gut when his partner shook her head brusquely.

“Still in the red, Barton.”

If it were only a real ledger, he could have paid it off or stolen it or set the damn thing on fire by now. God damn these moral metaphors and the intractability of their hold on Tasha Romanova. He told himself he wasn't going to take it personally; hopefully Tony would keep him busy enough that he wouldn't have to think too hard about how blatantly he was lying to himself. Tony, for his part, sighed theatrically.

“Red is right. The lady's just too Russian to go private. Just as well, I guess- someone needs to make sure these idiots don't let Rumlow burn the city down out of patriotic zeal. Good luck with that, Tasha, seriously.”

Tasha smiled, just a little. Tony glanced inquiringly at the Champions’ new and now-defunct liaison officers: Sharon was already shaking her head, but Sam took a step towards Clint as though to reinforce the shift in his loyalties. This time, even Fury let his surprise slip.

“Agent Wilson- are you sure?”

Sam looked a lot like Coulson had earlier- regretful but convinced.

“It’s not because of the STRIKE team- Rumlow definitely overreacted, but I was there- I can see how it would have looked like something wasn’t right.”

He glanced imploringly from Sharon to Tasha and then looked back at Fury.

“I really think Cap’s right, and I can’t just sit on my ass from now until tactical get whatever “hard evidence” they’re looking for. Let’s face it- that’s going to be the first attack, isn’t it?”

Sharon squeezed Sam’s shoulder, but when he looked up hopefully Clint saw that she was saying well done and goodbye for now rather than deciding to join them. Tony nodded once; his manner was all business, but Clint had worked with Iron Man long enough to see that he was deeply touched. 

“Principled _and_ pragmatic- we’ll absolutely take it. Welcome aboard, Falcon. Man, now there are two small birds of prey in this managerie. D’you think Doctor Strange will join and let us call him Merlin?”

“No,” Tasha said from behind him. Tony, for once, let it go.

“Shall we go retrieve the Barneses and get out of here? Nick, honey, it’s been real. We’ll call to say we told you so, okay?”

Fury did that uniquely-Fury thing where he glared without moving his face.

“Don’t call me honey, toots. Agent Romanova will see you off the premises.”

The emphasis on her title was subtle but pointed; they followed Tasha soberly out of the meeting room. In spite of his rising anxiety at the thought of taking off without her, Clint found himself fighting laughter almost as soon as they reached the holding cells.

“Hey, Cap? You know only Loki is supposed to go in the the god-proof cage, right?”

Thor’s glare was unusually fierce.

“He is not-”

The thunderer fell silent at a pointed look from Loki himself; it was Captain Barnes who explained.

“He ‘did not wish to be parted from his-’ from Loki.”

Clint added ‘dead-on impressions’ to his mental list of Bucky’s unexpected talents. Loki, visibly weighed down by the beefy hand clamped over his shoulder, sighed with exaggerated sufferance but didn’t comment. Bucky looked at Tony entreatingly.

“You _are_ sure they-”

Steph rolled her eyes and closed her hand around her husband’s forearm to get his attention.

“I think they’re sure, Cap.”

The captain relaxed visibly- a small, rueful smile said he knew Tony had done his best, and didn’t mean to complain. He met the trickster’s eyes first, then glanced at Thor to include him in the question.

“You _will_ be alright?”

“Sure, pal.”

Loki did a pretty good James Barnes too. Maybe it was a memory-sharing thing, or something; the trickster did look unusually friendly waving a dismissive hand in their general direction.

 “Go on, already.”

Everyone peered round at Tony when his phone sounded, jarring in the relative quiet; he glanced at it almost furtively, then grinned and read the message out loud.

“Bruce says says ‘Sorry about lab- made JARVIS show me what was going on.’ I really don’t know why he puts himself through things like that, but I guess we know about him and scientific curiosity versus the sensible option.”

“Stark,” Coulson said drily, “Consider yourself the pot in this analogy.”

Tony rolled his eyes, but he was still grinning. “‘At BB-’ what the hell is- oh. ‘At the Baxter Building working on matrices with Reed.’ We should get over there before they give Sue a migraine.”

Clint chuckled, but Steph and Bucky looked more apprehensive than amused by the prospect of yet another possibly-mad definitely-genius.

“Are you okay with heading straight there? If they’ve already got their systems up and running they’ll want you sooner rather than later.”

Bucky nodded; Stephanie smiled agreeably before looking to Natasha.

“You’ll keep an eye on these two?”

Natasha assured the captain’s wife that she would.

“If that’s everything,” Coulson said quietly. It wasn’t, or it shouldn’t have been, but there wasn’t much of what Clint wanted to say to Tasha Romanova that she would thank him for bringing up in the presence of SHIELD surveillance. He caught her eye, and tried to convey at least some of it without words.

“Shout if you need anything, all right?"

Coulson was already herding the others gently towards the door. If they had been anywhere else, Clint thought bitterly, he could at least have kissed her goodbye. Because she was a real professional, and had been long before SHIELD had required her to work with Hawkeye, the Black Widow still had both eyes on Thor and Loki when the door swung shut behind the team that wasn’t hers anymore. 

* * *

One tense, overcrowded car ride later, they were released into the care of Reed Richards and his family. The Baxter Building was an experience unlike any other: from the outside it looked at least as stodgy and official as SHIELD HQ, but the penthouse that was their destination was like a cross between Tony's lab and a Norman Rockwell painting. Clint had met the Fantastic Four before, so he wasn’t completely taken aback by the man mountain who met them in the dining room. Ben Grimm waved them in with gravelly good cheer- the geniuses were making real progress, he reported, but they were eager to talk to someone who could confirm or deny their various hypotheses. Clint grinned at Sam’s wide-eyed look and nudged his new teammate towards the lab; Tony had already made it three quarters of the way there with Cap and Mrs. Cap in tow.

They found Reed Richards gesturing at one screen and babbling about astronomical irregularities while Bruce, bent over a handheld tablet, argued that chemical analysis was a much more conclusive approach. Or something. Reed's wife Sue looked as thrilled as her brother Johnny at the prospect of any distraction from the scientists' disagreement. Before anyone had a chance to speak, though, the room was swept suddenly into darkness as the walls began to glimmer with tiny, probably mathematically precise depictions of some star sector or another. Clint decided he wouldn’t say anything if he didn’t have to- best not to insult the country’s leading astrophysicist by showing he could only describe the solar system in Star Trek jargon.

Johnny frowned at his brother-in-law.

“Did you let them have JARVIS jack into HERBIE? That’s kinda twisted.”

Tony seemed to think so too- he looked quite disturbed, his forehead wrinkling like he was fighting a sneeze. 

“No, this isn’t one of ours. Bruce?”

“I don't do my own modelling," Dr. Banner protested. "And I've definitely never seen this one before."

Stephanie wandered forward, casting an impatient glance over her shoulder as her ever-present shadow followed automatically with her hand still clutched tight in his.  

“The last I knew of them, their ships were here. These are the leavings of their spacecraft- to make such a trail they must be making great haste. They will be almost upon- Thor! By the might of Gungnir, if you do not release my arm I promise I will turn you into a frog and sauté your legs in garlic.”

The stunned silence which followed that outburst was emptier than the sector they had been searching. Everyone present stood in perfect silence for a second, just watching the awful spectacle of Stephanie Barnes flaying her husband alive with a glare that was certainly not her own. The beeping the Champions all knew and loathed startled the others back into action- Johnny Storm was fully ablaze, his sister had thrown a shield over the group, and Clint’s bow was strung and ready by the time Bruce decided what he needed to ask first.

“Please say you asked permission this time.”

Stephanie’s delicate features seemed to freeze for a moment, as though her image were buffering, then suddenly they were gone entirely and the trickster stood before them in full regalia. Out of the corner of his eye, Clint saw Ben Grimm reach out and pull Sue a couple of feet further back.

“It was his idea,” Loki said testily.“The Captain believes I can be of more assistance here than he would.”

Bruce, who had already made his position on Loki and the bag of cats quite plain, looked to Bucky-who-was-apparently-Thor for confirmation.

“It is as Loki says,” Captain Barnes confirmed, and Clint wondered first how anyone had imagined that could be anyone but Thor and then whether Steph and Bucky even knew the captain’s voice could go so low. He also wondered how no one had thought to check somehow- the bait-and-switch was such a classic Team Barnes strategy that it was practically a cliche. The way they'd done it was pretty damn sly, though- not one of Tony's people had questioned the poor, worn-out Captain's confining himself to nods and grunts and letting Stephanie- who was Loki, who had experienced about half of the Captain's life as if it were his own, by Bucky's own account- do the talking for both of them. 

“Fascinating,” Reed murmured, suddenly stretching from the waist to wrap around Thor-who-was-Cap. All but one of them had seen Mr. Fantastic in action before, whether in person or on TV, but it was deeply, deeply satisfying to watch Loki’s smug expression slide right off his face at the sight of a human being twisting in such an unexpected way. Reed barely seemed to notice the trickster’s startled scrutiny.

“He warps perception but not mass itself?”

Bucky’s face showed Thor’s consternation at having the unexpectedly rubberised scientist in such close proximity.

“Come, brother- end this illusion.”

Loki looked tempted to refuse, but quickly waved a hand with an affected boredom that would never fool Clint again. The son of Odin turned his guileless smile on the room at large as if he frequently helped to sneak his brother, whom he had thought was dead and who he still intended to arrest and take home for a hot date with Asgardian justice, defy SHIELD security by posing as his husband.

“Wonderful,” Dr. Richards beamed. He turned back to the screen and bent over its various command panels, already entering new data with the all the frenzy of a man on the very brink of a major breakthrough.

“Could you show us the area just west of Hesperus again? If we can identify the compounds causing those flares we should be able to detect those ships just from their emissions.”

Clint stared in disbelief. Sam went a step further and tried to get some kind of human reaction out of the astronomer.

“You do realise this is Loki? Thor’s brother Loki? Norse god of mischief and chaos?”

Mr. Fantastic met the Falcon’s eyes, expression stricken.

“You’re right,” he said apologetically- but the apology was for Loki.

“That must have been like gibberish to you. I need to see the _blástjarna,_ please.”

Both Clint and Johnny burst out laughing at Wilson’s potent look of disturbed incredulity, but Johnny’s sister huffed impatiently and shook her head as Tony and Bruce swapped resigned smiles. Ben Grimm did his best to put things in perspective for Sam.

“Stretch here was friends with Viktor von D for years- kinda spoiled him for other power-hungry d-bags, we figure.”

As soon as he was done nodding sympathetically, Tony rounded on Clint with a fearsome but not quite Loki-level glare of his own.

“What the hell are you so happy about?”

Clint hadn't even realised he was grinning.

“Still in the red, my ass. You know I really thought she was picking Fury over us?”

Of course Tasha had had time to make some kind of plan with them, or at least hear enough to realise that there was a plan- and if she knew they were leaving the 40s kids in SHIELD’s highest-security containment unit within city limits then of course she couldn’t let Stark abandon them without someone on the inside. Tony went still, reaching the same conclusions; his slow smile said everything Clint needed to hear about how well Tony understood his team. He was just about to grasp his newly independent leader’s hand when Johnny ruined the moment as only the Human Torch could do.

“Over there! No, to the left. Reed, that can’t be-”

From Loki’s face, Clint had to conclude it was. Tony, coming over to look at the monitor over Reed's shoulder, shook his head.

“Suddenly I'm quite glad you left my heirlooms behind alien-proof glass.”

“You’re welcome,” Loki said, very mildly for him.

“Though I would wager they will find a way to join us before the day is out.”

Johnny, very much in favour of more allies in the fight against unknown aliens, let out a whoop and offered Sam an enthusiastic high-five that made Clint feel very old.

Instead of commenting, Tony turned to Reed with mournful eyes and a furrowed brow.

“We don’t have a catch-phrase. Do you guys have a catch-phrase?”

Richards peered down his nose at Tony as if the engineer had started speaking in binary- though Mr. Fantastic probably did better with code-babble than with Tony’s leaps of not-really-logic.

“You know, ‘Fan4, roll out?’ ‘To me, my family?’ ‘Fly, my pretties, fly!’ Something like that?”

Mr. Fantastic wasn’t the only one staring anymore.

“At least one of those is from a cartoon,” Clint pointed out. Tony beamed, apparently interpreting any kind of response as support.

“I have a catch-phrase,” Johnny said thoughtfully. “Ben does too, but that’s more like some kind of early-warning system.”

“I’ll show you early-warning, flame-brain!”

Bruce’s watch indicated in no uncertain terms that he wasn’t in the mood to deal with another team's bickering.

“There are aliens heading for New York. We think they're almost here. All we know about them is that they want to kill us, or at least our friends. Or maybe just Loki, but still. I think catchphrases can wait.”

“That’s fair,” Tony conceded graciously, then frowned again.

“Your point, I mean; the fact that they want to kill us or our friends is grossly unfair. The unfairest of them all. If I were a magic mirror they'd get fuck-all from me in the way of golden apples.”

“That’s not how _any_ of those stories work,” Sam grumbled. “Should we make some kind of plan or are we just going to go stand in the park until someone hits something?”

That was how some of the Champions’ best fights had gone down, Clint reflected privately, but then they very rarely had a two-pronged attack planned involving both a scientific team and a group of heavy-hitters as defence and diversion rolled into one. It didn’t take too long to figure out who should go where, and before the portal they were watching was halfway open both teams were fully briefed and ready for action. Even Loki looked almost eager; Thor looked as battle-ready as ever, but his repeated glances in his adopted brother’s direction did suggest a very healthy anxiety about how far it made any kind of sense to trust Loki with a weapon.

“All right,” Tony cried as the last piece of his left gauntlet slotted neatly into place.

“Come on, Champions- let’s get this done.”

“I like it,” Reed said encouragingly. “Not very original, if I may say so, but on point.”

Thor was frowning at Loki again, this time looking concerned rather than reproachful.

“You are certain the captain and Stephanie will find their way unaided?”

Bruce let out an almighty sigh.

“Again: there are _aliens_ on their way to _Central Park._ It's not going to be that hard.”

* * *

Natasha shook her head at the sight of the mighty Thor stretched out on the floor with his head in Loki’s lap, one hand weaving in the air as he spoke. The trickster, listening quietly, looked more relaxed than Tasha had ever seen him. As she watched, he smoothed his brother’s mane-thick hair back with tender care. 

“Are you two even pretending to stay in character?”

It was quite unsettling how much Loki’s grin looked like the captain’s own when there was no malice behind it.

“Not really. Is anyone else paying attention?”

They really weren’t. Natasha, thanks most likely to Phil Coulson’s unerring sense for adventure still to come, was the only one assigned to keep an eye on them. She could only guess that either Fury was too busy dealing with Rumlow’s team to keep as close an eye on Coulson as he normally would, or he really did think that Tasha and Thor between them were worth the whole score of men who would normally have been swarming the room.

 “Does Ant’ny know your clearance is this much higher than his?”

The captain laughed. Again, the intervention of James Barnes’ more gentle nature made Loki’s high cackle sound a lot less psychotic than Tasha remembered.

“Would _you_ use your own clearance to spring Loki from HQ?”

Stephanie managed to look scandalized and delighted at the same time; her husband winked.

“You’re much less of a boyscout than I was led to expect,” Natasha admitted as the glass split apart to allow the other two through. James and Stephanie proved quite adept at sneaking- it stood to reason given their training, but Tasha had become so used to Thor and Tony that it was almost shocking to make it all the way to the nearest exit without even one  unnecessary quip or ear-splitting metal-on-metal screech. She had one hand on the door when Phil Coulson materialised out of the shadows. All three of them froze. Tasha was caught unawares by the unmistakable wash of guilt- normally she did what she had to do without losing much sleep over it, but she had always liked Coulson, and she knew Clint and Tony were fond of him too. Phil, however, tossed her a set of keys instead of raising a gun like Tasha was half expecting.

“There’s some good stuff in the trunk. If anyone asks, you were brainwashing me.”

The captain grinned again, waving one hand in a fair approximation of one of Loki’s magic-making gestures. Stephanie huffed in amusement. They must still be able to see each other instead of the illusion, Tasha decided- no one could look at Loki that adoringly, even if they had been married to him practically their whole lives. She shuddered at the thought just as Coulson let the door swing open.

“Take my phone- we should see if Stark has an update on those coordinates.”  

“I've got your update,” Captain Barnes muttered. Tasha glanced up sharply; she followed his gaze and completely failed to swallow a string of curse-words that would have made her Red Room trainers blush. Coulson nodded, both agreeing and dismissing himself on his own behalf. He disappeared the way they’d come just as the SHIELD klaxons began to blare. An automated voice demanded that all agents adopt their emergency positions without delay.

"Coordinates, huh? I could be off a couple streets, but I'm gonna say …62nd and 5th Avenue?"

They threw themselves into the car they had been offered and roared out of the parking lot bare seconds before the various corollaries of Code Red saw to it that no vehicle would leave for several hours. Cap's estimate was almost certainly right on the money, but it almost didn't matter- as long as they kept heading for the gaping wound in the summer sky that was spilling starlit night over Central Park it would be pretty damn hard to miss their mark.

 


	10. feudin' and fightin' I

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a fight, a fall, the beginnings of another fight or two.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this still exists! there is a whole second half! it will happen yet! thank you for still being here, people who are still here!

Steph wasn’t always sure what she thought of the way her husband seemed to change gears from Bucky to Captain Barnes like he was flicking a switch in his own head, but as they drew nearer to Central Park she was deeply grateful for his ability to distinguish between real life and the war. Her first thought when she’d seen the cold and spreading dark was that Bucky would be on his knees in a minute, but before Steph could so much as take his hand he’d caught Natasha’s eye in the rear view mirror and asked about thirty questions about Tony’s strategic approach to aerial combat. They could make out Stark’s team from far enough away, especially the distinctive red and gold suit weaving between the great black beasts Stephanie would never have believed if James had not already described them in as much detail as he could give her.

“Are they coming in one by one? That seems convenient.”

It certainly looked like it: the apparent hole in the sky seemed to be growing at an alarming rate, but the Chitauri avant-garde barely outnumbered Tony’s sparse team. Tasha grinned as her concealed earpiece flared to life, suddenly within range of the others.

“Good job, guys. Don’t worry, the A-team is here.”

Tony didn’t miss a beat.

“A for Ancient Relics or A for About Damn Time?”

“I really wish we’d had those,” Steph said in a low voice. Bucky nodded, a little bemused but aware that she meant the wireless radio system and not the clunky acronyms.

“Can he hear us?”

“Just about,” Tony answered for himself. “You guys okay?”

“Fine,” Stephanie assured him. “Tony, what the hell’s wrong with your guys?”

Tony didn’t seem to know how to answer, but Bucky was nodding in support of his wife's assessment.

“You need to go in a lot harder, ace- Thor’s the only one who’s actually killing them.”

Tasha found her tongue before Tony did.

“The Champions prefer non-lethal methods as far as-”

“I’ve seen the reels,” Bucky assured her, meaning the endless footage they’d been offered when he and Steph had asked JARVIS to show them Tony in flight.

“This isn’t your Doctor Doom, Stark- they’ve got an army up there. There’s way more of them than us, and I don’t think they know what mercy even is.”

“On your ten,” Tasha interrupted urgently; Tony swerved just in time to leave his pursuer on course for a head-on collision with the glass-and-concrete block in front of him.

“Nicely done.”

“Thanks, Tasha. That lethal enough, Cap?”

“Better,” Bucky nodded, but Steph couldn’t tell what he was hemming and hawing about until he blurted out his offer in a tone so tentative it was almost apologetic.

“Listen, Tony, you want I should call the plays? Just until we get this done, I mean, I’d never-”

“I can’t ask you to do that. You’ve just been through-”

Captain Barnes could not have survived the team he had never wanted to lead if he hadn’t learnt to recognize the best use of his people.

“We’re talking organized combat today, Tony. This is just the vanguard- they’ve got way more guys ready to come at us. Just think about it- I’ll be here if you want me.”

Tasha was already nodding appreciatively. Steph raised the hand she was already holding and let her lips skim her husband’s knuckles in appreciation and support. My hero, she tried to say; the best, the bravest, and the only man I’d follow out there _again_. Bucky said nothing at all, but turned to kiss her very quickly as Tasha stopped the car.

“No,” Tony wailed over the intercom.

“No, no, please, I know you’re going to save our collective ass as soon as I get you a mic but you have to promise never to do that again.”

“You still look like Thor and Loki to the rest of us,” Tasha explained when Bucky glanced up questioningly; Stephanie bit back a peal of laughter at the rising blush that, apparently, only she could see.

“Poor Cap,” she murmured. “Everywhere we go it’s the same.”

He scowled like it was the very bane of his existence.

“No one in Germany thought you were _my brother_ , kid.”

Tasha raised an eyebrow at the exchange, but didn’t ask- instead, she opened the trunk of Coulson’s car and smirked at Stephanie’s gob-smacked look.

“Told you he was one of the good guys. What’s your poison?”

Stephanie could have put together the Long Island Tea of arms and ammunition from the array in front of them, but she went for what she knew she knew she could use. James shouldered a dependable-looking rifle, then let Tasha hand her headset over and show him how it worked. By the time they were ready, Tony had darted in to land neatly next to them.

“We’ll get you guys your own by the next big one,” he said apologetically; Steph just shrugged. They’d done perfectly well for a good two years without any of that stuff. Howard must have talked about Bucky’s reluctance to assume command, Steph thought- Tony was trying to let Bucky off easy before they could even see his face.

“Look, you don’t have to-”

“Tony. There’s no one else who’s even been in the military except Wilson, and he met some of you even later than we did.”

The words were harsh, but Bucky’s tone was gentle.

“You think your dad was the only one who knew how to take care of family?”

Tony looked just like his dad when he didn’t know how to take unexpected kindness. He nodded slowly.

“Thanks, Cap. If you’re sure-”

Bucky grinned, steamrolling Tony’s awkwardness just as he would have ignored Howard’s.

“I’m sure. Stop slowing down this operation and go point your lasers at a monster or something.”

He turned to Steph before Tony could respond.

“Gotta get high enough to see what’s going on. You’re good down here with Tasha?”

Steph nodded readily; they didn’t have anywhere near enough people on the ground for her whole job to be looking out for him.

“Fine. You _sure_ you’re gonna be okay against these guys?”

His sober determination was familiar and deeply reassuring.

“’Course you are,” Steph answered herself for him.

“Go show these kids how it’s done, Cap.”

She had always loved it when he smiled like that, just for her, before they got down to business.

“Give ‘em hell, Rogers.”

 

Bucky had taken some pretty hair-raising routes as the leader of Phillips’ top squad, but never anything like being lifted over Central Park _by hand_.

“Howard would have _loved_ this,” he told Tony.

“And then Carter would have got us all suspended for letting him try it.”

Iron Man’s vocal modulation turned Tony’s surprised laughter into a garbled mess, but Bucky was smiling as he set foot on the roof where Loki and Dr. Banner were huddled over a complex chrome-and-wire contraption. His mam would have walloped him for staring so openly, but then Winifred Barnes had never seen a levitating woman fighting aliens with her mind, never mind a human flame-throwerand a man made of rock.

“I thought there were four of these guys.”

The rock-creature glowered like Stephanie did when someone started talking about the importance of segregation.

“Yeah? We thought there was one of you.”

Loki glanced up, curious, and Bucky would have sworn on his own mother’s name that the trickster was glad to see him.

“Captain.”

Loki waved a hand, not just in greeting; Tony’s relief was immediate.

“Perfect. Great, good, now you can kiss your wife whenever you- no, wait, permission withdrawn pending investigation. No making out with Thor as yourself, either.”

The Human Torch stopped hurling fireballs to stare at them.

“Can you hear yourself at all?”

“Says you,” the rock-man grumbled.

“Do any’a you care that the rest of us are fightin’ aliens here? Reed’s back at the tower and he’s been more help than you clowns.”

It was a fair point, so Bucky turned back to the scene he’d come up to survey. Tony, seeing that he was no longer needed on the roof, dove back into the thick of things. For a long moment, Bucky just watched the others. Steph and Tasha had already found a cluster of terrified tourists; Steph seemed to be somewhere between coaxing and bullying as she ordered them out of there while Tasha covered her. Sam Wilson hovered overhead, apparently calling locations before he and Clint raced to make the shot. At least it looked like fun, Bucky supposed.

“I just talk into this thing, right? You can all hear me?”

“Speak,” Hawkeye cried in a dramatic voice; Bucky could see him crouched in the treeline with his bow trained on one of the Chitauri.

“Your creatures do your will, Captain. Some of us have been waiting all our lives for this.”

“He refers only to himself and Stark,” Thor clarified because he was nothing if not candid with his shield-brothers.  

“I am gratified that our ruse was successful, Captain. As you see we have indeed located the beasts.”

“They located us,” Dr. Banner muttered from halfway into the machine he was working on.

“Less congratulations, more hitting.”

“We’ve been hitting,” Clint complained.

“They’re pretty hard to kill, Banner; maybe you should leave Loki and Richards to handle the doohickey and come, you know, smash.”

Thor was doing pretty well, though- as he watched, the so-called god of thunder brought his hammer down with an almost joyous shout; the lightning that followed the arc of his powerful arm brought his target crashing to the ground, down and out.

“Okay,” Bucky decided.

“You’re going to work together on this. Hawkeye, make sure Wilson knows what we’re up to; Stark, I need you to catch Widow and Rogers up.”

“Cap just called Agent Barnes ‘Rogers,’” Hawkeye informed the group in a hushed murmur; Bucky would have snapped at him to focus but the archer was already clambering down and gesturing for Sam to join him on the ground.

“This is the best day of my life.”

“Clearly, your life has sucked,” Tony said brightly.

“No offence, Cap.”

Bucky gave his instructions as if he’d missed the exchange entirely; Tony’s team took the hint and went about their work with quiet efficiency. They stopped going after the Chitauri one by one; instead, Tony and Sam worked with Johnny Storm- the fiery Human Torch- to drive the creatures down towards the tree-line as Clint, Tasha and Steph worked to keep the ground too hot for them to think about landing. At just the right moment, Sam and Tony dove clear, and Thor’s lightning took out the entire group in one staticky blast.

“Well played, Captain!”  

“All down to that lightning, boss. Well done, everyone. Can we keep this up for a bit, you think?”

They did. The Chitauri were nothing like their overlord, Bucky thought gratefully- they really did seem to be a hive mind, moving together at a lumbering pace, deadly more because they were built that way than because they actually meant harm. Once the team had a system in place their progress was almost mechanical. Bucky had almost begun to feel sorry for the hapless creatures, who snapped and thrashed but did not seem to understand that they were being trapped, until one of them hissed and Barton yelled in pain as its acid saliva tore through his protective gear as though it were made of sugar instead of leather and Kevlar.

“Barton! Report.”

“I’m good. Can't keep me down that easy, Cap.”

“You know we have like forty kinds of guns now that Tasha brought half of SHIELD’s armory, right? You can totally go one-handed if you- whoa." 

Tony let his suit stall, dropping quickly as a huge serpentine alien materialized behind him.

“Is this portal getting bigger? What the hell is Reed doing?”

They’d had to disable one of their jammers; Bruce explained why in his low mutter, but Bucky focused on making sure his team met each new threat instead of worrying about where they were coming from or why. “Five more minutes,” Bruce announced; the team gave a ragged cheer.

“SHIELD really aren’t coming, are they.”

It wasn’t a question; no one tried to answer it.

“Captain,” Loki murmured, suddenly right next to Bucky.

“I am no longer needed here. How may I assist?”

Before Bucky could direct him, the Torch’s sister shouted a warning- another enormous creature was materializing almost in their midst. Mrs. Richards threw up one of her powerful shields, but she had to concentrate her efforts on protecting Banner and the machine; Bucky lunged to cover his new recruit as the alien came down on them in a storm of teeth and armoured scales. Loki, long used to managing on his own, dematerialized and reappeared behind the creature, plunging his dagger into its neck.Which would have been fantastic, except that it left Bucky without anything between him and a very long drop over the side of the building. He caught the edge of the parapet with a yell of distress; Loki reached him just as Bucky’s gloves slipped against the time-smoothed stone.

Falling, it turned out, was not at all like hanging off the edge. Bucky had just had time to hope to god Steph wouldn’t find out until it was over before Tony caught him in his gauntleted grip.

“Never again,” Howard’s son said severely, actually dragging Bucky into a hug as they reached the roof again. Loki was already there, pale with concern.

“No more, Cap, okay? That’s a heart-attack either way, and a haunting if I miss next time. I’d much prefer you make out with Thor.”

“You will have to instruct me,” Thor murmured over the air.

“I am not familiar with the term.”

Hawkeye sounded like he didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

“Take it up with Dr. Foster, big guy. Everything okay up there? Can’t see from down here but that didn’t sound like fun.”

“Too damn close,” Tony muttered. Loki nodded with Bucky.

“Barton. Did Steph see that?”

He saw the archer glance over to Tasha and Steph some distance away before he shook his head.

“We’re not gonna tell her unless we have to, okay?”

Stark’s team nodded to a man.

“Thanks. All right, guys, let’s-”

This time it was Loki dragging Bucky out of harm’s way, taking him by the arm and reappearing to deposit him between Steph and Tasha.

“Cap! What’s-”

Loki disappeared again; moments later, the rock-thing and his best friend’s wife were on the ground with them.

“What the hell is he-”

Loki and Banner were the last to arrive, Banner’s watch going haywire as he tried to reason with the trickster.

“Loki,” Bucky ground out, “What the hell are you doing?”

“Salvaging your team,” Loki said fiercely.

“Captain, we have failed.”

Tony hit the ground with a metallic thud.

“ _How_ have we failed? By my count we’ve just got the last-”

Loki simply nodded at the rooftop they had vacated. At first, it looked empty except for the machine Banner and Richards had been using together. Bucky felt his knees go weak as he made out the cloaked figure Loki had somehow known to anticipate.

“We cannot fight him,” the trickster muttered.

“Not as we are. They have won.”

“Just today,” Steph murmured, edging closer at the sight of their distress.

“We can figure something out, right? We’ll keep you both clear until then.”

“No,” Banner was muttering desperately. “Tony, we can-”

He fell silent as the Other ripped the contraption apart as if it had been made of twigs and twine. For a moment it looked like nothing had happened, then the air was filled with the roar of wind or fire, and every trace of daylight was wiped from the sky.

“Sue,” Johnny Storm breathed.

“Ben, they really have an army.”

The ships were descending. There were maybe fifteen of them- even man to full-sized ship they were outnumbered.  

“We’re done,” Bucky muttered.

“Come on, we gotta get out while we can.”

“Calm down,” Tasha said to Bruce in her no-nonsense way.

“It won’t help anyone now.”

“No! Tasha, we have to-”

“Bruce,” Stephanie said quietly. Banner turned to her with such a wild look that Bucky had to fight the urge to fling himself between them.

“We go up there now, they’ll crush us one by one. We’re gonna get home and get some rest, make a different plan. Hope to god SHIELD counts a goddamn invasion as hard evidence. You’ll get more equipment, or maybe you’ll come back as the green guy and help us take their heads off. Cap and Tony will figure out how we’re gonna make this right, just not this second.”

The doctor nodded, defeated, and let Storm and his sister usher him towards their …hovercar. Bucky would have marveled, but there was an army of aliens overhead, and their troubles weren’t over yet.

“Brother!”

They all tensed at Thor’s yell- Bucky knew half of them were expecting Loki to have disappeared to join his erstwhile allies in their descent when the trickster slid bonelessly to the ground. Tasha looked from Thor, kneeling by Loki, to Bucky.

“Did he get hit? Barton, do you feel faint?”

He didn’t, but Bucky was sure that wasn’t it.

“He was hurt already, wasn’t he? He went into this with other injuries.”

From before, he meant, from out there. Stephanie saw his full-body shiver and took a step towards him. Bucky smiled to show he wasn’t in that kind of trouble yet.

“Thor, can you take him?”

The thunderer shouldered his burden with a combination of resignation, concern, and fraternal tenderness.

“I will take him to Banner. Anon, friends.” 

“God bless Agent Agent,” Tony muttered as they piled into the car Coulson had left them.

“At least one member of SHIELD is paying attention.”

“I'd say they’re paying attention,” Clint muttered.

"I'm pretty sure they’re shutting us in.”

As they pulled away from the epicenter of the attack, the light began to change- there seemed to be some kind of containment field in effect, Tony thought. A sound strategy insofar as it held- and insofar as no one minding sacrificing the portion of Manhattan trapped with the alien army.

They rode in worn-out silence, tumbling into the mansion to find Banner and Thor were seeing to Loki while Sam, who had gone ahead because he could, tried and failed to get in touch with Sharon, Coulson, or anyone at all who could disprove CNN’s grim conclusions. 

The text Sam couldn’t seem to tear his eyes away from read “SHIELD ABANDONS NYC”, but it wasn't the wording that left Steph reeling. The footage with which the network was backing up its accusation was shaky and out of focus, quite possibly taken off passers-by like the ones she and Tasha had retrieved. As Stephanie Barnes looked on, white-faced, the tiny but distinct figure of her husband plunged a good forty feet without any hope of recovery before Iron Man snatched him out of the air.

“Steph-”

She was shaking already, but Bucky only had to look at his wife to know she wouldn’t thank him for reaching out.

“When were you going to tell me?”

“Listen, a chroí-”

There was no arguing with the look in her eyes. 

“ _Were_ you going to tell me?”

She saw the answer in his face- in all their faces.

“Seventy years and it’s still a goddamn boys’ club, huh. Good to know.”

She looked away like the sight of him was painful.

“Stephanie, wait.” 

She didn't. She didn't even look at him. Stephanie was gone in a moment, every step heavy with hurt and anger, and for the first time in a long time- maybe ever- Bucky knew the only choice was to let her go.


	11. feudin' and fightin' II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thor and Loki disagree; they are not surprised. It goes about as well as anyone would expect.  
> Steph and Bucky disagree; they are quite surprised. It goes much worse than they expect.

“There’s nothing wrong with him, Thor.”

At home, Thor would have expressed his doubt with a grouchy thump of the mighty Mjølnir against the nearest hard surface. He was not on Asgard, however, and both Stark and the doctor had gone to great lengths to explain why the methods that proved most effective with the Warriors Three could only be detrimental to the “delicate, state-of-the-art” equipment they used in their sick rooms and laboratories. Because Frigga would not tolerate such ill manners, Thor made do with a fearsome glare instead of asking why Anthony Stark did not build his vaunted machines of more robust materials.

“If any more were ‘wrong with him’ I should have to address my concerns to the valkyries themselves.”

The Captain and his lady would have understood, he was sure, but Dr. Banner looked as confounded as if Thor had begun barking like Garmr himself. He began to give his explanation, but was quickly distracted by a crackling wheeze which sounded nothing like Loki’s usual laughter.

“Can you still be so naïve? There will be no valkyries for one such as myself.”

Thor hesitated, all too aware of how easy it was both to misunderstand Loki and to be misunderstood by him.

“One such as- I know you do not speak of-”

Loki’s eyes flashed, as cold as the dagger that was usually at his belt; Thor fell silent with a concillatory smile. Of course his brother had not meant the cruel secret of his birth.

“There cannot be many perpetrators of- how did your Iron Man characterise it?- regicide, fratricide and setting a remote-control flame-thrower on New Mexico.”

“Housebreaking too,” Tony reminded the trickster brightly as he strode into the room.

“I definitely mentioned housebreaking. I can’t believe you learnt my handle! We've all told Cap you like him best by far.”

Loki's face changed, but he made no acknowledgment. It mattered little: for all he had addressed Loki directly, Stark paid him and Thor very little mind. Instead, he skirted the steel-and-spring contraption Banner called an examination table to look over the doctor’s shoulder at one of the charts of which neither Thor nor Loki could make the least amount of sense.  

“That looks okay. I assume, I mean: JARVIS says there’s no emergency.”

“As far as we can tell. We have no baseline readings for a-”

The doctor blinked.

“I’m two borderline-racist insults and a mint julep away from getting cancelled in my third season.”

“Relax,” Stark beamed.

“You’re a geneticist, not a doctor. To whit: if you don’t need to fix E.T., and E.T. promises not to call home while we’re away, Reed and I would be oh-so-indebted if you’d come up and look at the formula he’s working on in case we have to neutralise them. Cap thinks the strategy is sound, but of course he’s not a geneticist _or_ a doctor so what I’m saying is come, now, please, only-person-qualified-to-make-this-call?”

Loki’s bemusement was almost a pleasure: he was so seldom at a loss, and to see him so made Thor feel closer to the boy he had once been.

“They often speak this way,” he told his brother confidingly.

“If it goes on too long the Lady Natasha teaches us card tricks to while away the time.”

“That wench is no lady,” Loki retorted, but Thor had seen him nod, reassured, before he addressed the men of science.

“You may leave us,” he announced in his abrasive way.

“I gave your Captain my word that none of you would come to harm.”

Loki seemed determined, but more than that he still looked too ill to so much as lift his head. When Thor nodded his consent, the doctor allowed Stark to drag him from the room.

“His father was much the same.”

Thor laughed, caught off-guard by Loki offering any comment in a civil tone, much less an observation about the Stark family.

“You speak as though you knew him.”

Loki did not smile.

“It is through Stark’s efforts that the captain and his wife were retrieved. They were close as brothers by the end- the Captain’s words, not mine. I’m sure I cannot imagine it.”

Clearly Thor had been measured against the elder Stark and found wanting- though at his most combative Loki could have found a piece of kindling more worthy as a sibling than the one he had, so the case was not as illustrative as it could have been. Thor stifled a sigh and sought to show patience. His brother had been unwell. His brother had been a captive. 

“If you will not tell me your grievance how can I respond? Speak plainly, Loki; you know you are often too subtle for mere soldiers.”

Unusually, Loki did as Thor suggested without agreeing with that assessment scornfully and at length.

“Did _anyone_ look for me, or was it straight on to the victory feast?”

There was far more vulnerability in the question than Loki had shown within Thor’s sight in a long time. The thunderer closed his eyes, dismayed. In fact they had not looked for Loki- but there had been no reason to. All their wisdom said Loki must have fallen out of their reach, and indeed Heimdall had sworn as many times as Thor had demanded it of him that his brother was beyond the all-seer’s sight.

“How can you think there was a feast? We mourned you, Loki. Our mother mourns still.”

The trickster’s eyes were Jotun through and through- harsh and unforgiving, cold with resentment.

“You are mistaken.”

“I am not,” Thor told him, resolute. It was no exaggeration, whatever Loki chose to believe.

“She longs to see you again. When I returned with the Tesseract her only questions were of how you fare, and when you will come home.”

“I have no home,” Loki snarled, and Thor saw that his brother’s willingness to speak in friendship was dwindling, and quickly.

“And you are wrong in any case. The wife of the Odin can bear no love for Laufey’s son.”

“Perhaps not as the Allfather’s Queen for the Jotun heir,” Thor agreed gently, “But in her regard for those she calls her own there is none so constant as the Lady Frigga.”

For a moment, he thought it might have been enough- but of course Loki’s expression hardened as quickly as it had ever grown soft. The doctor was right, Thor realised much too late- his brother was in perfect health. A ruse within a ruse- a double bluff, Clint Barton would have said- or more than that. Another one of Loki's complex plans, understood only by the lone creature whose interests they were designed to serve.

“Brother-”

“We are not kin,” Loki snapped.

“We have never been kin; we never will be kin. It is entirely for your mother’s sake that I do not end your miserable life before you can be any further hindrance. You should defend your realm, Prince of Asgard; when my army comes it will not look to parley.”

“Loki, wait-”

He was already gone.

* * *

Steph got most of the way through Natasha’s highest-intensity accuracy-training programme before even she had to admit that venting her frustration in gunpowder and wasted bullets was doing nothing to erase the looping image of her husband falling, falling, falling. He was okay, she reminded herself- Tony had got there in time. Just like he’d clambered back into that goddamn train with seconds to spare, just like that first HYDRA monster had killed Erskine but not his first successful patient, and just like it had been by the grace of God alone that he'd lost his arm instead of his life in the accident that seemed so long ago now. What was one more almost-bought-it, really, in their never-ending series of near misses?

She put away her pistols, thanked JARVIS solemnly, and washed her face because she’d always hated it when Aggie had seemed to turn on the waterworks to get her way with Gary. When Steph found her husband, he was nursing two fingers of a whisky so fine it probably cost more than their rent back home while the guy who should have been his godson, but who was closer to twice their age than half of it, talked through whatever he was working on in that rapid-fire way that was Stark through and through. The affectionate, slightly bewildered expression on Bucky’s face was so familiar that Stephanie was halfway to scanning the bar for Peggy and the others before her brain caught up with itself. Her husband whipped around at her stifled sigh.

“You okay, my Steph?”

He only meant to check on her and Steph knew it, but that gently teasing tone felt all wrong while she was still trying unsuccessfully to stop thinking about trains and skyscrapers and alien abductions and all the ways one stupid James could get himself killed if his wife wasn’t hanging onto him with both hands and a grappling hook. Maybe Bucky thought he was giving her an out, but Steph didn’t want to pretend everything was fine, and she definitely didn’t want be pandered to like some hysterical housewife who had to be managed before she made a scene in front of her husband’s friends. Before she knew it Steph was spoiling for a fight.

“Dunno. Never fallen off a building before, so I guess I don’t know that word the way you use it these days.”

Bucky sighed, which only made Steph more determined to shake him until he came up apologetic and conciliatory rather than tired and resigned.

“We’re really gonna do this, huh. Listen, Tony-”

Tony plastered a falsely cheerful grin over the muted anxiety of someone who remembered what it looked like when his parents were on the verge of screaming at each other.

“I’ll go check on Sleeping Loki and his- no, you know what, I can’t even joke about it anymore. I’ll never unsee that, Captain Nightmare Fuel, I hope you know that. I'm gonna talk to Bruce, I meant, about Reed's big plan.”

“Get outta here already,” Bucky muttered, grinning; Steph thought he was inches away from ruffling Tony’s hair. Howard’s boy offered them one last worried smile and left the way Steph had come. Determined not to be placated by any combination of pleading and flattery, however sincere, Steph went on the offensive before Bucky had time to set down his glass.

“You know you should have told me, right?”

“We were in the middle of a-”

“Don’t give me that. You weren’t gonna say one word after.”

Bucky looked more puzzled than defensive.

“What would have been the point of freaking you out after the fact?”

Clint’s phrase on her husband’s lips grated on Steph’s last nerve. It wasn’t fair that he was using their goddamn slang as if it came naturally while she still had to check the urge to call a Russian assassin “Peggy” every time she registered red hair in her peripheral vision. She tried to speak like a reasonable person instead of someone becoming convinced that her best option was to hit the idiot with a brick so he'd just stay down until this new emergency had passed them by.

“You’re supposed to trust your wife.”

“Steph, of course I trust you.”

He was starting to sound annoyed now. Steph thought she preferred it to the mild confusion from before, not least because it made her feel much less guilty for fighting back.

“Not enough to tell me what’s going on with you. Or to listen when I-”

Bucky laughed, not at all impressed.

“You really think I don't listen to you? Woman, even when I was your commanding officer we only ever did things your way.”

She had no answer to that- Captain Barnes had always run his team like a democracy instead of just giving orders, but everyone had known that Agent Barnes’ vote counted extra. The men had laughed it off, Peggy and Howard had found different ways to say they thought it was adorable, and Phillips had rolled his eyes at every available opportunity, but they'd all tolerated it because the system worked. They were at their best together, Steph had always known; it had never occurred to her that Bucky might give any thought to the chain of command as it applied to the two of them.

“Sometimes I think we should never have gone to that goddamn fair,” she confessed without any kind of segue, meaning the Stark Expo of 1943. It wasn’t what she’d planned to say, and from his face Bucky would not have been more surprised- or more disturbed- if she’d got his rifle out and shot him in the chest just for kicks.

“No. Steph, no. You don’t really mean that.”

She kind of did, though. Of course she’d loved Peggy, and Gabe and Jim Morita, and the kindred spirit she’d never expected Bucky to find in Howard Stark, but to meet those people they’d had to trade on the friendships that had made them who they were. There had been times, back then too but especially in the new life they’d never asked for, when Steph had found herself wondering why she’d ever insisted that they leave their apartment in the first place. Bucky had been beside himself for weeks about Stark and his wonders of technology, but when the day itself had finally rolled around they almost hadn’t gone at all. Steph, frustrated and anxious as news from the front lines got more dismal every day, had been close to landing them in real trouble at the pictures when Bucky had seen the fire in her eyes and kissed her soundly before she could yell at the jerk in front of them.

“Don’t,” he had muttered, sympathetic to both sides.

“He’s just scared, a ghrá. These guys all know they’re on borrowed time.”

It wasn’t any excuse for being so disrespectful to good men dying to keep America safe, but Steph had let her husband distract her instead of starting something that could only end with Bucky wasting his one afternoon off brawling in some back alley. By the time the show was over Bucky’d been wearing nearly as much of Steph’s lipstick as she'd had left, and she’d warned him, giggling as he took her arm, that unless they got cleaned up quick they’d be late for the future. Bucky had grinned, way beyond repentance, and kissed her again, and then again, and if Steph hadn’t put her foot down for the sake of Stark and his damn car they might never have made into the bedroom, let alone back out their front door in time to meet their friends.  

“We were happy, J.”

He nodded, but didn't meet her eyes.

“We didn’t know any better, I guess.”

That could not be how Bucky remembered their life before the war- he made it sound like they’d been settling for what they could get, and Brooklyn had been good enough just until someone offered them the Upper East Side. She glared for all she was worth, more hurt than angry. Her plan was to demand how he thought two years in the thick of World War II had been any kind of step up, but what she said instead was much, much, more damaging.

“You marry me because you didn’t know any better too?”

She knew as soon as the words were out that she should never have said them. Her husband was on his feet before she found her tongue again.

“Is that what you think of me? Christ, Stephanie. All I meant is it’s only because we went to that goddamn fair that you can go a whole day without your own lungs trying to kill you.”

Of course that was it. Steph nodded, tight-chested and panicky with remorse.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that.”

Bucky was drawing away already, hunched in on himself like he was preparing for a body blow.

“Is there another way to mean it? It's not like it used to be, you know- you'd be just fine on your own if you wanted out.”

“What are you talking about, 'if I want out'?”

Bucky stared into his glass rather than looking at her, explaining in the shaken monotone Steph had come to associate with her husband getting ready to do something very stupid for her sake.

“God knows you shouldn’t wish you could get a do-over on more’n half your marriage, Stephanie. You don’t get sick, you could get most any job you chose- you don't need me like you used to, a chroí.”

He might as well have laid her flat with their shield. Steph’s voice shook as she clutched at Bucky's hand like she could wring a denial out of his poor fingers.

“James, you’re not askin’ me if I want a divorce.”

He cringed like the word itself was poison, but shrugged slightly.

“Just sayin’ you can have it, if that’s better than putting up with a guy who’s so bad at this that you can’t figure out why he married you after six goddamn years. I’m not ever gonna be the reason you get stuck where you don’t wanna be, Steph, okay?"

She was still trying to process how they’d gone from “I wish you’d talk to me” to “if you want to leave me I’ll help you do it even though I can’t say the words out loud” when Loki appeared between them.

“Captain, I’m afraid I need your assistance.”

The sad smile he offered Steph was much more unsettling than any of his carefully menacing grins.

“I will not ask for your forgiveness. If you value your life or his you will not try to follow.”

Her hand clenched around empty air, Loki having taken her husband from her-again- before they could so much as let go of each other.


	12. it only hurts for a little while

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki claims his army. Not for the first time, Bucky pays for peace with more than he really has to give. Steph screams and screams.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warning at the beginning instead of at the end so people can avoid this if they want to: this chapter is violent and it does not end well.

Thor would have been close to disappointed tears by the time Central Park came into focus around them, but James Barnes’ anger was cool and very calm.

“So did they spook you showing up in numbers like that, or have you been playin’ me from the start?”

Loki, who had looked his own father in his face as he ran him through, was discomfited to find he did not want to meet the captain’s resigned eyes.

“Perhaps both,” he admitted softly. He did not say he would never have involved the boy a second time if he could have made the Chitauri believe him on his own; there seemed so little point in trying to justify himself at so late a stage in the game he had not told the captain they were playing.

A moment later he was thrown backwards, pinned by the Chitauri leader’s superior strength. A group of his followers herded the uneasy Captain Barnes forward, but their commander paid him little mind.

“You dare show your face here after your betrayal.”

“It was no betrayal,” Loki insisted. He opened his mind and tried to offer his thoughts without resistance.

It had simply been insurance. No strategist worth his own reputation would simply hand over something as precious as the Tesseract without proof positive that Thanos and his underlings would make good their own promises, so Loki had taken it from Stark’s mansion as his own pledge of good intentions before returning it to ensure that the Chitauri army would understand why they were invading Midgard, and what they had to gain in following Loki. He would have explained, he added, playing up his wounded regret for time and goodwill wasted, if the commander had let him say one word after they had found their precious gemstone out of reach again.

“So suspicious,” Thanos’ minion muttered.

“And how convenient for you, Loki Silvertongue, that the gem has found its way to Asgard.”

Loki beamed as the ashen-faced captain winced.

“That was a bonus even I did not foresee.”

The leader of his future troops did not seem impressed.

“Asgard’s forces are far stronger than any these creatures could muster. Are we to risk the Master’s army in true battle to find this is another of your conceits?”

There were no other tricks, however: this was the gambit on which Loki had staked everything. He dragged his captive forward before Barnes had realised he was about to move, forcing the soldier to his knees mostly for dramatic effect.

“This is no Midgardian trap. You may see for yourself whether I have spoken false.”

The captain writhed as the alien raked through his recent memories with enthusiastic curiosity. The facts were plain enough in the boy’s mind: there were none- not one soul on the whole forsaken planet- who would have trusted Loki more, or to whom Loki would have dared trust anything, and James Barnes himself had known nothing of Loki’s designs until he had been dragged unwilling from the quarrel Loki had interrupted.

“Trickster,” the Other smiled with cold appreciation.

“You have been very clever about this.”

Loki inclined his head.

“That is the natural way of things.”

“The boy is aggrieved,” the Other observed. If it was a test, Loki thought, it was not especially sly.

“He truly hoped to call you friend some day.”

“That was his mistake,” Loki observed dispassionately, allowing the alien to see his regret as well as his resolve. The Other nodded.

“The Chitauri will stand with you.”

And not a moment too soon, apparently: the alien horde began to stir as lightning flashed; Captain Barnes, still shuddering from another cruel encounter with alien telepathy, cursed under his breath as the mechanical whine of his friend’s armoured flightsuit made itself known.

“God damn it, Steph.”

Loki started; he had not expected the girl to be with them, clinging to Stark because, clearly, she had not dared to wait for any other form of transport. That was a complication he had hoped to avoid.

“I believe it would be in our interests to leave before the Thunderer raises the alarm.”

The Chitauri commander jerked his head at their still-unsteady prisoner.

“Finish this.”

Of course Loki had known it was a possibility, but in spite of himself he had hoped to spare the lad.

“He is insignificant- I offer you far greater prizes. You may watch me dispatch Odin and his heir.”

“We will do that as well,” the Other told him evenly.

“It must be done, Silvertongue. Proof positive, as you say.”

To Loki’s surprise, it was James Barnes who saw his confusion and offered the explanation.

“My pal Jack Miller used to say you shouldn't ever take back a gal who left you for another guy, ‘cos all you'd know for sure that you didn’t know before is that she’s the kinda gal who’d leave you for another guy.”

The Other, incredibly, nodded his agreement.

“At least one of you understands.”

“Loki,” Thor growled from above- he was almost upon them, his voice still more pleading than accusing.

“Brother, please. It does not have to be this way.”

For the first time, Loki wondered why Captain Barnes had not tried to fight him at any point so far.

“He will die for the hive. They are uncomplicated creatures, but not without honour. Decide, Trickster.”

Loki already had one hand on the captain’s shoulder.

“You will be honoured,” he murmured.

“Captain, I have no doubt you will be avenged.”

James Barnes laughed, a bleak but not uncertain sound.

“You know she’s going to kill you herself, right?”

There was real fear in his voice- for Stephanie, Loki realised. The captain had been prepared to die to see the aliens leave the city he loved; he had not meant for his beloved to be subjected to the sight. Stephanie herself, feet skimming the ground as Iron Man completed his descent, did not seem to have realised how far gone they were already.

“Bucky, you gotta-”

James Barnes’ eyes found his wife’s as Loki’s dagger flashed against his throat; the boy fell heavily, choking on blood. Stephanie rushed forward, blind to the Chitauri closing in, and slid to her knees next to her husband. He wanted to be with her, Loki thought, but was already too weak to do more than try to smile as she gathered him into her lap.

“James, it's okay. You're okay- you're gonna be fine. Don’t you dare give up on me, Bucky, you hear?”

He could not so much as close his fingers about her wrist. Stephanie's entreaties were sweet, her gentle touch determined, but the captain stilled in her arms before she could do anything for him.

Loki would have been dead himself, he was sure, if his army- really his, now he had given them this moment-had not been keeping Thor and Iron Man at bay. How wonderful to have sacrificed his only hope of friendship for the security of brute strength. When he could no longer bear to look upon what he had done, Loki worked the last of Frigga's tricks that he dared allow himself and took the boy’s motionless form out of sight.

A bright comet sparked across the sky. To be sent thus beyond the mortal realm was the highest honour the Aesir could bestow upon a warrior. Thor’s sharp intake of breath said the thunderer had recognised the gesture, but it did not strike Loki that the others might not understand until Stephanie flew at him in a tempest of devastated wrath.

“ _What did you do_?  Bring him back! Bring him _back_ , you monster, you know he hates it out there _.”_

The Other seemed fascinated. He was almost gentle as he addressed the captain’s- widow?

“We felt his mind fade, girl-child; what can you want with what remains?”

Stephanie shuddered from head to foot, clutching at Loki’s hands like a supplicant. Her voice was shot through with misery, but her eyes were dry.

“Please, I have to take him home.”

On one side of their strange embrace, Thor and Stark watched with much more horrified grief than outrage in their combined gaze; behind Loki, the Chitauri army began to wonder what kind of commander took no action against a woman so frail with suffering that she could not take the revenge she longed for so violently that they could feel it without the use of force.

Ruthlessly, the son of Laufey reminded himself that he had chosen the path his army would now make smooth long before he had ever laid eyes upon James or Stephanie Barnes. He closed his eyes; when he opened them again, he wore the mask most of the nine realms believed to be his natural face.

“I did tell you not to follow us if you wanted him to live.”

The girl stumbled back, stricken by the suggestion that her disobedience had led to her husband’s death. It had not, of course, but the Chitauri commander was already smirking with grim approval of Loki’s return to form. The leader of Thor’s sorry Midgardian assembly caught the shaken woman before she fell. He was more sober than Loki had ever seen him.

“Look, we can still-”

“We cannot, Stark. Take the girl and get out of my way. Only this time, you understand, because her husband was as worthy as any opponent I have ever known. I will not be so generous again.”

“Opponent,” Stephanie whispered; her eyes flashed with righteous fury.

“You bastard, all he wanted was to help. He trusted you, you god-forsaken -”

“Go,” Thor urged his teammate; Stark tightened his grip on the young woman and soared away. Because Loki had given them leave to depart, his army made no move to hinder them. The thunderer, by contrast, was surrounded by more of the brutes than even he could have withstood. And yet, perhaps because he was Odin’s son in all the ways Loki would never be, Thor continued undaunted to plead and bargain and harangue in that same hopeful, wounded tone that made Loki want to set the fool’s beard alight.

“Loki, you must-”

No exchange between them had ended well after such a beginning. Loki smiled more coldly still.

“I _must_ prepare my army; I believe I mentioned my plans in that regard. I _must_ confess I had expected that you would at least attempt to do the same.”

The great hulking creatures whickered their approval, but did not seem inclined to let Thor leave. Their leader voiced their confusion at Loki's methods and motivations.

“He is our enemy, and he is at our mercy. Why do you urge preparation when you could end his life?”

“What challenge would that be? I will not have my subjects account their new king a coward. No, we will take him in battle, and let his father watch him die. Or let him watch his father die. Or watch them kill each other in single combat- now _that_ would be entertainment!"

At last, his new second-in-command showed true eagerness.

“Lead, Trickster; we are content to follow.”

Not for the first time, Loki turned his back on Asgard’s favoured son. With determination born of necessity he shut the image of Stephanie Barnes screaming in Stark’s metal-clad embrace out of his mind. He would not think of Frigga either, he decided, until the battle was lost and won and it fell to one of them to decide the other’s fate.

"Come. We need not dally if you are so eager for sport. Asgard and your infinity gems await."


	13. I don't want to go without you

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> aftermath and Asgard's call to arms

Clint and Tasha had been watching Sam gape at Bruce and Tony in full science-mode when JARVIS had broken in, edgy and upset, to say that Loki seemed to have taken a side at last. Thor was ready to go after him, but as Loki had taken Captain Barnes along as help or hostage Stephanie would appreciate Sir’s presence as well, please. Tasha had dragged Bruce from the room before he or his watch could protest; they could hear her urging him to focus on her voice as Tony snapped at Reed to keep working on the Chitauri problem and let him deal with his own team.

“I have to go. Keep an eye on Steph, okay?”

Clint had caught Tony’s arm before he could call the armour to him.

“You’re kidding, right? She has to go with you.”

“Barton, how can I-”

“Tony, come on. We gotta go now.”

Faced with Stephanie herself, more shaken than she had seemed the first time Loki had vanished with her husband but even surer than Clint that she had to go after him, Tony didn’t hesitate. Because Tasha had the Banner situation well in hand, Clint and Sam went upstairs to keep an eye on the news in case anything changed on the alien invasion front. JARVIS reported that Iron Man was on track to catch up with Thor just as Tasha came to join them. Dr. Banner had a lot of work to do, she reported matter-of-factly, so she had left him to it.

“Will he be all right on his own?”

Tasha, recognising honest empathy instead of the morbid curiosity most SHIELD agents showed around the Hulk, spoke candidly. She thought it helped that there was immediate and urgent work to be done, but Bruce was especially frustrated with himself for not making a bigger fuss about the fact that he had more or less identified Loki’s apparent infirmities as fake.

“He’s got to know that doesn’t make any of this his fault.”

Tasha only shrugged.

“I suppose he’s no more to blame than any of us.”

They’d all known how dangerous Loki was, she meant. Tony should never have let them within a hundred yards of anything that could be called a mission, and once Loki had absconded with the captain they should have known to classify James and Stephanie Barnes as victims, not new colleagues. Stephanie had been so close to shock right after her husband had been taken, and the captain himself incapacitated more than once by those vivid flashbacks- but when they should all have known better than to let them anywhere near a battlefield they had put a headset in his hands and let him call the shots.

“Tasha, I- I mean. We never-”

She took his hand, a soft look in her eyes.

“I know. I wanted to believe it too.”

JARVIS emitted the electronic hum that was his version of clearing his throat. Clint glanced upwards reflexively.

“Please say you have good news.”

“Iron Man will be on the roof in a few minutes. Mrs. Barnes is with him.”

Sam had already been around long enough to recognise that Tony’s A. I. communicated mostly in words not said.

“Why does that sound like the opposite of good news?”

JARVIS hesitated; that was much worse than Tasha trying to be gentle. Clint frowned.

“What is it? Thor’s mad at us because Cap punched Loki in the face? Odin’s mad at us because Thor and Cap both punched Loki in the face and then Steph shot him?”

“They were too late to stop Loki. Mrs. Barnes was with her husband when he died.”

“That’s not right,” Clint protested, swaying a bit but resisting angrily when Tasha tried to press him back into a nearby chair. Sam had closed his eyes as he lowered his head; Clint thought he might be praying.

“It’s got to be a trick. Loki wouldn’t just off him- they’re friends, almost, aren’t they?”

“Only according to Loki and his mark,” Tasha said softly.

“He must have wanted us to send the Tesseract back to Asgard- it’s no surprise he’d rather be king there than here.”

In grief, frustration, and simmering anger, Clint found himself fighting not to hold Natasha’s past against her for the first time in years. The Black Widow had plenty of experience with too-trusting military men and the ruthless tricksters who exploited them for fun and profit. He looked away, unclenching his jaw to address JARVIS instead of saying something he wouldn’t be able to take back.

“How’d he do it?”

Sam glanced over with concern in every line of his already sickened expression.

“Clint, man- you sure you want to know?”

It wasn’t really a matter of wanting anything.

“How do we look after her if we don’t know what went down?”

He sure as hell wasn’t going to ask Tony or Thor where Stephanie might hear them. JARVIS, still reluctant, waited for Tasha’s calm assent before he told them what had happened.

“Loki severed his carotid artery.”

The bastard had cut his throat, he meant, and they’d got there too late to help but in time for Steph to watch her life-long love bleed out in front of her. It felt too plainly stated for something so brutal- even Tasha looked unsettled now. Clint’s hand clenched where his bow should be.

“Is she…”

Unable to make himself say ‘okay’ out loud, Clint let the useless question trail off.   

“They will be here momentarily,” JARVIS offered, which was more than Clint could have come up with to fill the heavy silence.

* * *

They reached the roof to find Tony letting go of Stephanie as though releasing his hold on her was painful. Clint did his best to look at anything but the blood on her clothes and hands.

“Hey,” Sam said softly; Stephanie, blinking like the light was too bright, tried to say his name. The Falcon took her elbow before anyone else could speak.

“You need to get changed. Mind if I walk with you? These two can look after Mr. Stark.” 

“This one’s Ant’ny,” Steph corrected him in an insistent, worried voice they’d never heard before.

“Mr. Stark was his daddy. Howard.”

She let Sam shepherd her downstairs, answering his careful questions about her friendship with Howard in the same unsteady, almost childlike voice.

Tony, barely managing to meet Tasha’s eyes, shrugged when she asked whether he needed anything.

“I’d love to forget I just watched my dad’s best friend get killed while his wife cried all over him, do you have anything for that?”

For the first time since Hawkeye had been introduced to Iron Man Clint thought Tony looked every year of his age, and maybe more than that.

“She was- he wouldn’t even let her put him in the ground."

He took a slow, unsteady breath.

"The good news is I think the aliens have had it with Central Park; Loki’s got them heading for Asgard as we speak. Except we had to leave Thor to- wait, no, here he comes. Shows what I know, I thought for sure- I really can’t tell whether Loki’s lost the plot or I have.”

Thor landed with the usual static buzz. He didn’t even try to muster up a smile.

“Where is-”

“Wilson’s looking after her. Kid used to be some kind of paramedic-he seems to know the SVU drill. Don’t take this the wrong way, okay, but why the hell did Loki let you go?”

Clint hadn't realised Thor even knew what cynicism looked like.

“For the first time in his life he is concerned with sportsmanship.”

There was almost no way to reply to that; they stood, paralysed, until Tony clapped Thor briskly on the shoulder.

“Okay, so. The show must go on and all that. Reed has some ideas about closing the rifts- we’d rather keep the fighting on your side if you think you guys can handle it. I hope the home team’s warmed up.”

On this one count they seemed to have kept some semblance of control: Thor had raised the alarm before he’d even left the mansion to go after Loki. It involved a complicated use of the rainbow bridge that Clint would have been beyond processing even at his sharpest, but the point seemed to be that the Chitauri forces were on track to find themselves both anticipated and outnumbered when Loki mounted his attack on Heimdall’s gates.

“Well done,” Tasha murmured, darkly approving.

“Tell your men to wipe the floor with them.”

Thor nodded gravely.

“I will return when I can.”

“With Loki,” Clint put in, realizing he had quite a specific request to make.

“Tell your dad we want a turn before his date with Asgard-style justice.”

Thor looked oddly appreciative.

“Should I tell Odin you wish to wipe the floor with the trickster?”

He might have meant it as the closest they could come to a joke, but when the others nodded as earnestly as if Thor had just given them their next assignment he inclined his head with the same gravity before re-settling Mjolnir in his grip.

“Keep well, friends.”

* * *

 

Two floors below, Stephanie was sipping the sweet tea Sam had given her very little choice about drinking when the thunder crashed outside. She leapt to her feet, going for the gun Sam hadn’t steeled himself to take out of her reach before she was ready to relinquish it voluntarily.

“He’s not leaving without us?”

Sam told her very gently that he hadn’t thought Tony’s team had any plans to take their fight off Earth.

“That was before Loki took my James.”

Neither SHIELD nor Stark himself had the kind of equipment they might need to join in the Asgardian fight, and the more Sam thought about it the surer he was that they’d only get in the way even if they could get involved.

“Thor’s got this. I think we have to let them do what they do, you know?"

Stephanie was still watching the window as if she expected to see her husband round the corner at any moment.

“He never even tried to get away,” she muttered.

“He knew what Loki wanted, he must have, but he just- let him do it.”

Stephanie turned to Sam with horror in her eyes.

“It’s not because he thought I wanted-”

She broke off, overwhelmed, and let Sam draw her into his arms.

“Of course not,” he told her roughly, sure even without context.

“Any fool could see he never wanted to be anywhere more than right next to you.”

Stephanie, trembling in his embrace, looked painfully like a little girl as she nodded.

“Stupid boy. I told him, didn’t I, but he never goddamn listens.”

Steph didn’t specify what she’d told him. Instead, she turned her face into Sam’s shoulder with a heaving sigh.

“It’s not fair. Sam, it’s not fair."

There was nothing at all Sam could have said to that, so he just stood with her, rubbing her shoulders clumsily and wishing Stephanie Barnes had anyone at all outside Tony’s house of barely-functioning emotional misfits to see her through the coming months.

“When I see Loki again I’m gonna break his fucking neck with that shield of ours.”

The abrupt announcement startled a laugh out of Sam, but it also provided a timely reminder that the woman in front of him was no wilting damsel lost without her knight.

“Yeah, you will. Good for you, Agent Barnes.”

Stephanie looked up sharply at Sam’s use of her title. Her eyes were bloodshot, her whole expression raw with hurt and anger, but she came closer than Sam had hoped to meeting his tentative smile with one of her own.

* * *

 "My Lady! You must step away from the interloper.”

Frigga laughed freely, waving Thor’s closest companions over- as though they would have waited for an invitation if they thought she might be at risk. The interloper Sif referred to was laid out in front of Frigga, motionless in the grass. He was not only unconscious- he had hardly been breathing when Frigga had come across him in the grove so few of the Aesir even knew existed.

“My son has filled your heads with dread and disaster. This young man could not hurt me if he wanted to. Did Heimdall tell you about my visitor?”

It could have been no other; in this regard, Heimdall was as bad as Sif and the warrior boys. Not unusually, Fandral answered for the group.

“He said only Loki knows the spells by which these passages are opened.”

“Not only Loki,” Frigga said mildly; her son’s friend looked chastened at the reminder that she herself had taught Loki most of what he knew in that regard. She smiled, taking Sif’s outstretched hand before the girl could grasp her patient by the shoulders.

“Carefully, now. He has been used very cruelly.”

This seemed to pique their interest; all four drew closer to see the still-ghastly wound that could so easily have been a death blow. Volstagg whistled through his teeth.

“Cruel indeed. With a knife, unless I am much mistaken?”

“A dagger, perhaps. Silver, I think- quite likely with emeralds in its hilt.”

There was real anger in Fandral’s lilting voice. Frigga inclined her head without reproaching him- of course Thor’s friends had their own grievances to bear. She stroked her patient’s cheek, soothing the rising distress she sensed as he tried again to wake.

“Not yet,” the queen whispered in a voice rich with magical persuasion.

“Rest, child. You are among friends.”

“Is he?”

Hogun, reserved as ever, spoke with less open hostility than Fandral had, but his skepticism was clear. Frigga fought the urge to mortify the Vanaheimer stoic by running fond fingers through his carefully-arranged hair.

“Whatever you think of Loki, you will own that this boy has done nothing to deserve death.”

Fandral nodded, accepting the queen's wishes now he knew she would be safe. Sif continued to eye the young man curiously.

“I don’t understand,” she confessed at last.

“Why would Loki do this, only to send his victim to you?”

“A warning,” Hogun suggested, brows knit. Fandral nodded.

“Or a threat.”

Frigga shook her head slightly. Loki had meant for her to save the young man, she was sure.

“A cry for help, I think.”

Volstagg’s very beard quivered with his concern.

“With all due respect, my Queen- why should you answer such a cry after everything the trickster has done?” 

“He is my son."

To their credit, none of Thor's companions voiced the objections Frigga knew had crossed their minds. The words were barely past her lips when the great horns blared. The call to arms was swift and firm- Odin’s forces were urged to assemble in haste. Sif straightened hastily, one hand going to her scabbard; Hogun and Fandral were already several paces away. Frigga smiled gratefully at Volstagg when the older warrior lifted her fragile charge into his arms without waiting to be asked. He spoke, as he was wont to do, with a kind of quotidian irony. 

“I will question his loyalties again when he can speak for himself. This call, at least, we should all heed.”


	14. lost in a fog

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steph has very specific difficulties in the aftermath of …the thing they're not talking about. Clint offers the simplest solution.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm here! this is happening! This chapter is really short because it doesn't really connect to anything else; Asgard is on the cards for next time.

“Steph? Agent Coulson’s come by again. You wanna say hi today?”

Clint had asked some variation of that same question for over a week by this point, so Steph was at a loss to explain why or even how he still sounded so goddamn hopeful.

“D’you really think I should?”

Her friend didn’t hide his surprise and curiosity- for all his optimism, of course Clint had expected her to shake her head, glare half-heartedly, and go back to the book she hadn’t really been reading, the programme she hadn’t really been watching, or the sketch she hadn’t really been working on. 

“You always ask like you want me to say yes. Why?”

He looked like Jack Miller that time his mam had caught him stealing cookies when Steph was ten. She’d have forgiven Clint for begging off entirely- it was a pretty thankless question and she knew it- but he just smiled and gave an offhand kind of shrug.

“He’s a nice guy. I always thought he’d be a lot of fun if he weren’t my boss. He’s into all kinds of things you’d never expect.”

“Like trading cards,” Steph said quietly. They’d had no idea at all why Coulson had wanted them to sign baseball cards until he’d produced the strangest collectibles Steph had ever seen. She shook her head, suddenly light-headed.

“I can’t.”

Of course SHIELD would know what had happened- they must have had to tell Fury how the alien infestation had just cleared up like a spell of bad weather. It was too hot, she thought, but too cold as well.

“Clint, I can’t.”

It would have been Tony who had had to tell them, probably. The walls seemed closer than Steph remembered. He must have done- whatever else there was to do, as well, when there wasn’t going to be a wake, and there weren’t really any people to-

“I can’t. Please don’t make me-”

“Hey, no.”

Clint caught hold of her gently, bracing her shoulders from the front with practised, almost professional hands.

“No one’s going to make you do anything, Steph.”

She was shaking like a leaf, but it didn’t feel like asthma or after a nightmare or when she thought of yet another person she’d loved who’d already been gone for years.

“Sorry,” Steph muttered, disoriented and embarrassed but more than that much too aware that the hands on her shoulders weren’t the ones she needed. After a moment, Clint let go and moved to sit by her instead of crouching in front of the bed.

“I’m sorry,” she repeated.

“I didn’t mean to-”

Having no idea what to call it, she left her sentence dangling and focused on trying to breathe like- like her own lungs weren’t trying to kill her. Steph bit back a sob, staring helplessly at her lap because she didn’t know where to look when all she could think about was what she wouldn’t see.

“It’s okay,” Clint promised; Steph’s jaw clenched reflexively, but she’d already seen too much of her own pain in his eyes to imagine that he meant it in the way she’d never forgive.

“Maybe you just need to tell someone, you know?”

Steph shook her head like he’d accused her of treason.

“I can’t.”

 “You can’t tell someone, you mean, or you can’t come hang out with Phil?”

“I just can’t. I can’t go talk to your friend who thinks he knew my husband because he read some books. I can’t look at Tony while he’s so goddamn _sorry_ all the time. I can’t draw because his eyes come out all wrong when he’s not here and I can’t think because I don’t know whether I want to remember or not and I  told Sam I was gonna get Loki for what he did, _and I am,_ okay, but I don't know  _how,_ Clint, when I love him like I could die of it but I can't even  _say his name_ anymore."  


She was half expecting him to laugh, or at least to look completely confused, but Clint just smiled a little and squeezed the hand he'd caught.

“I could say it for you. If you want.”

Steph would never have guessed that that might help, but once he’d suggested it she thought it was the only thing she wanted.

“Yeah?”

“Sure. It won't even take too long- it’s pretty short.”

“It’s not,” Steph frowned.

“He’s got five. Well, four. And a half.”

“I’m gonna guess the half is Bucky.”

Steph flinched at the sound of it, but she let Clint put his all-wrong arms around her and hold her gently, if not quite the right way, as she nodded against his shoulder.

“Okay,” he murmured.

“Four to go. You might have to help me with-”

“Francis,” she whispered, and her voice didn’t even shake. Probably because no one had ever, ever, called him that except on their confirmation day. Clint drew away, nodding enthusiastically, and reached for something Steph hadn’t noticed him put down when he’d come in.

“Great,” he said brightly, holding out a faded photograph in a new-looking frame. 

“Look what Phil found for us, huh?”

Steph’s first impulse was to close her eyes and scream until someone came and shot Clint and saved her or vice versa, but the fact was she’d never seen a picture quite like the one Clint had brought with him.

“The one with the awesome jacket is Agent Stephanie Barnes,” he murmured confidentially.

“The team called her Steve in this outfit, though. They say Captain Barnes was really strict about that.”

Steph watched her hands tighten on the frame as though they belonged to someone else, but she nodded because it was true. He and Howard had been so careful- which was why there were so few photos of her in her field clothes. Very carefully, Steph let her fingertip brush the dark hair that fell across the captain’s face as he bent over a map, brow furrowed in concentration. Clint grinned.

“That’s the guy. James Buchanan- Francis?- Barnes, but mostly his guys called him Bucky.”

“Or Cap,” Steph murmured, thinking of the boys who would have followed him anywhere.

“Or Cap,” Clint agreed, and Steph scowled as fresh tears heated her cheeks.

“Stupid boy,” she whispered.

“Always running off and getting into mess. You know we had to spring him from a HYDRA fort?”

There was no way in hell he didn’t know that, especially since he’d been friends with Tony for years, but Clint just grinned and let her tell the story. He hugged her again when she got to the end, and even though it was still all wrong it didn’t feel like a travesty at all.

“Any time you need to hear it, okay? Or if you want to practise with a friend or something.”

If it had been anyone else Steph thought she’d have been sure they were making fun of her, but Clint’s sincerity was as clear as the still-tragic affection in his face.

“You don’t have to do this alone, okay?”

Steph nodded, tried- though not very hard- to smile, and resolved to say hi, or at least thank you, the next time Coulson turned up. She made Clint take the photo away with him, though- she wasn’t sure how much longer she could stand to look at it.

“Bucky,” she whispered later, mainly to see if she could do it without Clint. When the world didn’t come crashing to an end, Steph sighed deeply and tried again a little louder.

“All our friends called him Bucky,” she told JARVIS like he might have missed the memo,

“But he was my James, and he was my whole life.”


	15. gonna run you down

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bucky meets the Warriors Three; Bruce is done with Tony's misplaced guilt.

“-vanced scout of some description?’

“Son of Bor, I hope you don’t send your scouts ahead of your army  _fatally wounded_.”

As the white noise around him separated into distinct voices, hushed but fraught with the particular tension of opponents who loved each other really, Bucky’s first thought was that the SSR had never found his team such a nice place to hole up in while they got over the last big disaster. His next thought was that it had been an improbably long time since he’d been witness to a bust-up between Howard Stark and Agent Carter. The thought that finally got him to open his eyes was that he’d been sure Howard’s accent was more distinctly New York.

“Indeed not, but Loki is not a-”

“Yes?”

The woman, whom Bucky had mistaken for Peggy mostly because her voice was female, exasperated, and definitely not Steph’s, sounded more than a little skeptical.

“You must see that I cannot take such a risk on faith alone.”

“Nor would I ask you to. Speak to him yourself, if you will not hear me.”

And then the whole exotically costumed crew was watching him, their expressions ranging from cautiously welcoming to mostly hostile while their weapons ranged from fairly straightforward to frankly ridiculous. Behind a row of younger- guards, probably?- stood a forbidding older guy with what looked like a metal inset for an eyepatch. If the room itself hadn’t given the game away, let alone the fact that its occupants all had swords and spears instead of handguns, their intricate armour would have told Bucky what he needed to know as surely as a stack of calling cards.

“This is Asgard. You’re- Odin?”

No one had expected Bucky to address the big man in town directly. As the uncomfortable silence stretched, Bucky let his eyes slide sideways to meet the much friendlier gaze of the woman next to him- Frigga, he guessed, whom Loki had called ‘the one who should have been my mother.’ When Bucky’s hand jerked towards his throat, Thor’s mother spoke before her husband could.

“It was a near thing, but unless I have been very foolish it will not trouble you now.”

“Thanks,” he muttered, because his mam and Steph’s had raised him right. It didn’t make any kind of sense, though.

“Why’d he do it, if he meant for you to fix it?”

One of the guys in the front row huffed triumphantly- obviously, he’d asked the same question at some point. Frigga smiled, acknowledging his thanks, but made no comment on Loki’s motives. A stone-faced soldier dressed mostly in grey fur and what looked like blue silk gestured impatiently.

“Your name?”

“Barnes,” Bucky started automatically, then realised that his rank and serial number couldn’t mean much on Asgard.

“James. I guess he might have called me Bucky, but-“

“James Barnes of Brooklyn!”

The fur-clad one said nothing, but turned to watch another guy- taller, very blonde, and wearing an outfit that put Bucky in mind of Errol Flynn as Robin Hood- as he started forward eagerly.

“You are the Captain of the guard!”

He didn’t grab Odin’s hand like an over-eager kid, but Bucky thought he wasn’t the only one who suspected it had come close to that.

“It was at his urging that the Son of Coul was persuaded to surrender the Tesseract!”

By the time Bucky had made sense of that, Thor’s father was watching him steadily, waiting for him to confirm or deny the identification.

“I told him I thought you guys’d have a much better idea what the hell to do with it than us, sure. God knows I’ve had enough of it to last me several lifetimes.”

Odin’s expression hardly shifted, but he nodded once. The room warmed perceptibly as everyone relaxed.

“My son has spoken of your bravery, and of your sacrifice.”

It was a strange thing to say to the guy who’d more or less brought a war down on their planet before they’d ever even met. A terrible thought occurred.

“You do know they’re comin’ here next, right?”

“Aye,” the impossibly broad man next to Errol Flynn beamed.

“It will be a worthy thing, if Thor spoke true.”

Bucky frowned- apparently they hadn’t thought to ask Thor if he knew the Earth guy bleeding out in their palace.

“Didn’t he want to stick around for the fight?”

The broad one frowned, but it was the girl next to him- almost literally radiant in sparkling silver and deep crimson- who answered.

“He raised the alarm from Midgard. Heimdall urged him hurry back, but he said Stark’s team was in peril.”

Bucky had forgotten these guys had known Tony and the ‘Champions’ longer than he and Steph had.

“Did you not know?”

He’d been the one in peril, Bucky thought. Thor’s friends looked admiring. Very few, the Errol Flynn one asserted softly, stood against Loki more than once, and lived. Bucky frowned- that much he did know, and he still wasn’t sure _why_ Loki kept going most of the way to murdering him and then changing his mind at the last second. Mistaking the cause of Bucky’s growing frown, the bigger guy tried to reassure him.

“It is well, young man.The army stands ready; in any case their ships are not yet on the horizon. The Thunderer will lead the charge yet.”

That wasn’t really Bucky’s biggest problem with the situation.

“Sure, but- I mean, that’s great, but they all saw- you’re saying Thor doesn’t know that Loki wasn’t really-”

He fell silent, not least because he had no idea what Loki had been trying to do- in the moment he’d been pretty damn sure he was going to die. The Asgardians waited for him to continue, every face as blank as if he’d been speaking in tongues. Because it was important in so many immeasurable ways, Bucky tried again as simply as he knew how.

“My wife was there when Loki came at me. I really need to tell her I’m not dead.”

Odin looked reluctant, but Frigga put a hand on his arm and met his eyes with purpose.

“I would want to know,” she said simply. The craggy lines of the Allfather’s face softened, just for a second, into an expression of pure tenderness.

“Take him to Heimdall,” he barked at the girl with the gleaming gauntlets. Her three companions snapped to attention with her.

“You  _will_ be at your posts before the order is given.”

Thor’s friends didn’t click their heels like the boys of the 109th would have (on an exceptionally good day, anyway), but the effect was the same. Odin offered his wife a bulky forearm; Frigga caught Bucky’s eye as she took it.

“I would thank you, James Barnes, for trying to be a friend to him.”

“Frigga,” her husband snapped- he would do what she asked, Odin’s hard look said, but there would be no socialising- and certainly no open affection for Loki, who was the cause of all this- before their work was done. Thor’s mother smiled at Bucky, warm and encouraging, but allowed her husband to usher her firmly from the room.

“Come,” the man in furs said when they were alone.

“We must reach the Bifrost before Heimdall is called away.”

They made their way briskly towards the guardsman’s post, Hogun and Fandral leading the way while Volstagg brought up the rear. Sif, who seemed to know the most about Thor’s earth-bound activities, asked after Clint and Natasha by name and burst out in delighted laughter at the face Bucky made when she asked if he had heard of Fury.

“The Shield  sounds most tedious,” she offered sympathetically,

“But after all their Fury has been of much assistance from time to time.”

Not so much recently, Bucky thought a little sourly, but then all thoughts of Fury and SHIELD were driven from his mind by the spectacle of Heimdall’s place of work.

“Is _this_ what you people call a guard house?”

Heimdall’s approving laughter was even more like thunder than Thor’s.

“Indeed, James Barnes. Your friends will be most gratified that you are well.”

It was impossible to even wonder how he knew. Bucky nodded, grinning self-consciously, then bit his lip and asked the question he really wanted answered.

“Is my girl okay?”

Heimdall’s blurry gaze turned inward for a moment, but then the helmeted head snapped up, and a heavy hand closed on the strange handle that stood before him. Light filled the room without warning or discernible source, and then Bucky’s escorts were raising a triumphant cry of welcome.

“Captain? James Barnes, can this be so?”

Bucky lowered the hand he’d thrown up to shield his eyes and gave Thor a lopsided grin.

“Thanks to your mam, apparently. And Loki, I guess, for sending me up here.”

The others looked discomfited- praising Loki really wasn’t the done thing, and it wasn’t like Bucky couldn’t see why- but Thor’s sober look shattered into a beaming grin. Bucky had just enough time to brace himself for a crushing embrace that could, he thought, have done as much damage to the unprepared as the hammer now pressing into Bucky’s shoulder.

“Captain, I am so glad.”

Bucky’s smile was entirely sincere.

“Thanks, pal.”

Thor looked to Heimdall, his manner suddenly very brisk.

“I must return the Captain to Midgard. The lady-”

“They are almost upon us, my Prince.”

He didn’t say they _couldn’t_ , exactly, but Bucky remembered Odin’s stern admonishment not to miss the call-out and knew it was implied. 

“It’s okay,” he muttered, even though it wasn’t- he’d seen Thor’s face when the big guy thought of Steph. But they were all soldiers there, and it would hardly be the first time any of them had put the requirements of service ahead of personal preference.

“We’ll get these guys first, huh, then you can take me home and tell her I’m a hero on two worlds. She’ll like that.”

If she didn’t skin him alive for getting into a whole different kind of trouble without her there to save him from himself. Thor’s grin was utterly without guile.  

“Then you will stand with us.”

Bucky lifted his chin, partly because it was Steph’s particular way of expressing her brand of immovable determination and partly because he knew Thor’s eye would be drawn straight to the still-healing cut that had nearly been the end of him.

“It’s my fight too, isn’t it?”

Thor smiled so widely Bucky wondered how it wasn’t hurting him.

“It will be a glorious day,” he announced. His friends gave another rousing cry in affirmation.

“Great,” Bucky grinned, as close to enthusiastic as he could feel about joining a war he might have started on a planet he’d never seen before.

“I don’t suppose one’a you has a semi-automatic lying around somewhere? Or a pistol, I guess.”

Some minutes later, he stepped out of what passed for an Asgardian weapons store, marvelling at the almost immaterial lightness of the armour he wore and trying very hard not to imagine Howard’s face if he could see the helmet Fandral had insisted was non-negotiable. Thor gave a cheer of approval, but there was friendly challenge in Sif’s eyes as she handed him a large, elegant sword.

“I hope you know what to do with this.”

Bucky shrugged; he was pretty good with other blades.

“I’m pretty sure I won’t cut off my own foot, if that’s what you mean.”

Thor laughed raucously, mostly at his friends’ poorly concealed looks of horror.

“Midgardian wit,” he explained with the air of an explorer showing off a beloved specimen.

“And yet-”

He disappeared the way Bucky had come and emerged with a huge golden disc  over the arm that wasn’t semi-permanently attached to his hammer.

“Perhaps this will be more to your tastes.”

Thor smiled warmly when Bucky asked disbelievingly when he’d ever even seen the shield.

“When I first met Stark, he was much involved in the project of your recovery. Hawkeye and Agent Coulson showed me many images of your team in battle- they told me much about your chosen weapon.”

Bucky could only imagine.

“I was quite eager to try my own hand at it, but Stark said he would sooner give it rocket boosters than allow another to lay hands on the thing before you and the lady were well enough to give your own consent. He was quite adamant.”

That sounded like Tony, Bucky thought warmly. He grinned at the others as he gave the weapon Thor had offered him an experimental shake.

“Yeah, Tony’s good people.”

It wasn’t vibranium, and it hadn’t been precision balanced by Howard Stark himself, but there was a reassuring solidity to it, and- Bucky spun quickly, bringing the shield crashing down from overhead as though to knock an opponent out.

“Yeah,” he confirmed.

“This’ll do fine.”

Thor led the way with an easy confidence Bucky hadn’t seen before- suddenly, it was very obvious that he’d never seen the guy on home ground before. Immediately, he wondered whether being on Asgard would be an advantage for Loki too.

“They are here,” Heimdall announced gravely. Bucky followed Thor’s upturned gaze and bit back a curse at the sudden appearance of the Chitauri ships.

“Is Loki still with them?”

The brotherly concern that still laced Thor’s question was both touching and a little sad; Heimdall answered without inflection.

“Aye.”

Bucky decided he wasn’t going to think about that. They’d given him a job he knew he could do- along with Thor’s friends, he was going to join the men on the ground in engaging the Chitauri so they wouldn’t realise the Asgardians knew about the whole hive-mind thing until Odin and the big guns were ready to strike. It was, Thor confessed with no small amount of admiration, essentially a magnified version of the plan Bucky had devised for the Champions.

“I would ask you not to fall from any heights this time,” he added with grave affection. Bucky shuddered, but then grinned.

“Can’t, can I, without Iron Man to save my bacon?”

“Excellent,” Thor smiled, understanding the sentiment even if his brow furrowed in momentary confusion at Bucky’s choice of words.

“Then we will meet again when we have done the deed.”

 Sif and the others gave a yell of approval- Hogun even went so far as to smile broadly enough for Bucky to see some of his teeth. The Commandos would have loved these guys, he thought abstractly, and closed his eyes against the image of his own mismatched team getting ready to give the invaders hell. Only moments later, the halls shook with the blaring of the horns- Thor’s people were ready to tangle. The roar that went up was “for Asgard”; Bucky grit his teeth, thought of his girl out there convinced he’d gone and left her on her own, and knew he’d never need a battle cry to remember why he was, somehow, still fighting the same god-damned fight.

“Let’s go,” he murmured, settling someone else’s shield more firmly on his arm, and grinned at Sif when she nodded approvingly at him as she raised her sword.

* * *

“You’re know you’re going to run into her eventually, right?”

Tony glared at the chestplate he’d been adjusting. He had tried, he would have howled if he’d known how to say it without sounding like a whiny teenager. For days and days he’d tried to talk to Steph, but every time he’d so much as caught her eye she’d cringed and glanced away- not that Tony blamed her. He’d stopped trying after a while, and for all he knew it had done more good than he could have done in person- JARVIS reported that Clint and Sam between them had managed to coax Steph out of her room at least once a day for close to a week.

“My dad gave me one job, Bruce.”

“He’d understand, though- by your logic it’s his fault they ended up on ice in the first place.”

Tony threw down his screwdriver and turned to glare at Bruce instead.

“Are you high?”

Bruce shrugged with the studied calm Tony hated most of all his friend’s various modes.

“Your dad introduced them to Erskine, got them into the SSR, and put Barnes on that plane. If there’s any one person to blame for how it all ended it’s Howard Stark.”

“Or Johann fucking Schmidt, maybe? What the hell are you saying, Banner?”

The bastard’s watch didn’t so much as beep.

“So how would _you_ characterise Howard’s role?”

“He was their friend! He did everything he could, even afterwards. You know that. Bruce, you of all people-”

“I do know that,” Bruce murmured, smiling slightly.

“And they both knew it too. Of course he wouldn’t blame you, Tony- your dad _or_ Captain Barnes.”

Tony supposed it had been a bit much to hope he’d never have to hear that name again.

“But I-”

“Kept Stephanie safe. Brought her home, and kept her going afterwards.That’s what he’d say, isn’t it?”

It was, too.

“I should never have let them go up against Loki.”

“Why not? You knew they were at least fighting fit- they’d already gone up against the Hulk that same day.”

Tony had completely forgotten that. Bruce kept smiling even as his eyes took on the downcast look that invariably accompanied what little he chose to say about the other guy.

“She never even hesitated.They had no idea what they were up against, but she saw he was down, grabbed that shield, and got between her man and the danger zone.”

He patted Tony’s hand with the kind of understanding that could only pass between people who knew what it was like to bring as much pain as joy to the people they loved.

“She doesn’t blame you, okay? She’s in the gun sim right now so she’ll be sharp the next time we come across the guy she does blame.”

It made sense, in its own way- keeping busy to keep sane. Howard would never have said so out loud, but it was what he’d done, running all those expeditions with an energy that had never flagged with time or tide. Tony glanced back down at the armour he’d been repairing and tried very hard not to recall how long it had taken him to get the captain’s blood out of the grooves, and how close he’d come to melting the damn thing down rather than having to look at it. Before he could say anything else, JARVIS cleared his throat by way of chiming in without ruining the moment completely.

“Sir, Agent Coulson and Dr. Richards are here.”

Tony’s hands stilled where they’d been shifting restlessly over his armour.

“What, together?”

“Yes, sir.”

Given recent events, Tony had JARVIS alert the rest of the team so that anyone who was up to checking in would know something weird must be going down.

“Dr. Richards reports new activity at the wormhole, sir. It appears SHIELD has noticed the same.”

They had, in fact, come together over the same data- which Reed had sent ahead, he added a little testily.

“I’m sorry,” Tony grumbled.

“It’s not like we had other things to think about.”

Which wasn’t fair, exactly, since he’d been hiding in his lab instead of cuddling with Stephanie- or whatever it was her more competent friends had been doing- but Bruce seemed to have reached his daily limit for Tony’s guilt complex.

“We’re paying attention now.”

Things had been dormant for days, Dr. Richards reported, but in the last few hours there had been a marked change in the quantity and frequency of unexplained interactions.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Tony’s automatic dismissal dissipated on his lips when he realised Clint hadn’t come in alone. Stephanie Barnes stood between him and Tasha, looking like she hadn’t eaten, slept, or seen the sun in days. Her eyes, intent on JARVIS’s projection, were red-rimmed but as sharp as Tony had ever seen them.

“They’re coming back,” she decided confidently.

“Thor’s guys are hammerin’ them, and they’re looking for a back door outta there.”

Both Coulson and Richards nodded grimly.

“Good,” Tasha said softly; Tony turned in surprise and almost took a step backwards in dismay when he found Stephanie smiling just as coldly as Agent Romanova.

“Let them come.”

Thinking of his father, and of the friend he’d already failed, Tony reached out to the captain’s wife and tried to hide his surprise when she let him take both her hands.

“You don’t really want to do this,” he murmured.

“I couldn’t save him.”

It was, as far as Tony knew, the first time she’d acknowledged her husband’s death out loud.

“Steph-”

She shook her head, cutting off his reassurances.

“Couldn’t save him,” she said again,

“But you can be damn sure I’m gonna avenge him before we’re done here.”

Coulson seemed to have the same reservations Tony was having so much trouble voicing.

“Agent Barnes, maybe you should-”

“It’s what he would do,” she interrupted softly. Behind her, Clint was already nodding wildly; Sam’s smile of predatory anticipation was worryingly similar to Natasha’s. Even Bruce looked as close to battle-ready as he ever got. This was important, Tony saw, and not just for Stephanie.

“Captain America’s avengers,” he muttered.

It was better than SHIELD’s Champions, at least.


	16. battle cry of freedom

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> things come to a head on Asgard; Bucky finally gets back to Earth.

As the golden spires he had known since childhood rose before the alien ships, Loki forced down another unpleasant wave of guilt. He wondered if he would ever forget the girl’s face as she had pleaded not even for her husband’s life but for the chance to lay him to rest in the manner of her people. He would have liked to give her that, at least, but perhaps-

“I told the Master you were weak.”

Loki could not have denied the charge if he had wanted to, but he let his lip curl in impatience all the same.

“What proof would it have been of anything if the demonstration cost me nothing?”

The Other did not hide his skepticism, but he _had_ already watched Loki relive the moment when his dagger met the captain’s throat more times than Loki cared to account for.

“I trust it has not cost you your resolve.”

Loki shot his alleged ally a withering look as he reached for his dagger.

“That _would_ be unfortunate.”

In the distance, Loki made out the death-or-glory roar that was Asgard’s rallying cry. He smiled in spite of himself.

“I have given much to see this moment made real.”

The Other raised his scepter to issue the command.

“To war,” he said grimly. To war they went, but not like Loki had ever seen before. Long used to Odin’s drills, and more recently familiar with the savagery of the Jotun, he found himself taken aback by the blinding efficiency of brute strength. The Chitauri did not take the gates, as Loki had envisioned- they crashed through them as though they were made of sand. They made swift progress, barely hindered by the feeble efforts of Heimdall and the advanced guard. Next to Loki, the Other laughed with wicked joy- but then he had never had reason to pay attention to the gathering roar of thunder drawing near.

“Now!”

Loki jumped free just as a towering bolt of lightning hit. The Chitauri began to scream and scatter; Thor’s friends fell upon them with the joy only true warriors of the ancient ilk knew how to take in battle. The Other had been carried away in quite a different direction, which freed Loki to grab the thunderer’s hand and fix him with a pleading look that had served him well since childhood. Thor softened at once, though Loki could see the effort he made to hide it. This time, at least, that would not be necessary.

“Thor, the Captain-”

“He lives,” Thor said shortly, but Loki had always been able to read the older prince.

“He is here,” he realized; almost as soon as he had had the thought his eyes lit on the young man in the middle distance, fighting not with sword and shield but with the shield alone, and occasionally his fists.

“He fights like a Vanaheimer,” Loki observed as though it was of any importance; he was quite taken aback by how genuinely glad he was to find the boy alive and even thriving. As though sensing their attention, the soldier turned his head. They saw his whole frame stiffen as he recognized the tell-tale horns of Loki’s helmet. The creature fighting Captain Barnes collapsed under a startlingly determined blow, and the men around him rushed to fill the gap he left to race in Thor's direction.

“What are you-”

“Captain,” Loki broke in, still in the unfamiliar grip of pleased relief.

“I am so glad to find you well.”

The shield connected with his collarbone. Barnes was hardly a match for a Jotun’s strength, but he had taken Loki entirely by surprise, and the blow was enough to send them both crashing to the ground.

“She was screaming, you callous, cold-blooded-”

Loki caught hold of the shield, but made no effort to strike back.

“I told her not to follow. I did not think she could.”

James Barnes laughed derisively.

“You were _in my head._ You saw her show up on that damned plane in the middle of the arctic and thought she’d let a couple blocks slow her down after what you said to her?”

“I gave you my word,” Loki said quietly. Both Thor and the captain tensed when he gestured with his dagger, but it was no offensive strike- Loki only meant to indicate the direction of the battle still going on around them. Well within view, the Warriors Three and their various allies were demolishing the Chitauri offence as easily as if they were children playing at war instead of soldiers engaging an enemy of any note.

“Upon reflection I felt that Asgard’s forces stood a better chance than your friends.”

Thor growled, thoroughly frustrated.

“Why did you not _tell us_ you hoped to draw them off?”

“It would not have worked,” Loki confessed; he saw the moment when James Barnes understood.

“He doesn’t need that scepter thing,” he realized, meaning the Other. Loki did not think the boy knew his hand had risen to his throat.

“You needed us to believe it was real or he wouldn’ta gone for it.”

More to the point, Loki himself had needed to believe it _could_ be real. He let go of the shield that hung between them; cautiously, the captain lowered it. Loki chanced another rueful smile.

“I believe the word I want is ‘sorry,’ yet again. I will tell your Stephanie the same, if she allows me to live long enough.”

The boy’s eyes had warmed perceptibly. Presumably he would have spoken, had Thor not chosen that moment to fling himself forwards in alarm.

“Mother, how in the name of-”

The chill down Loki’s spine was immediate and almost disabling. He found her distant figure very quickly: Frigga was holding her own against the swarm that seemed to have driven her apart from the contingent that should have protected her. Thor’s mother was a capable swordsmith, of course, but she was fearfully outnumbered, and- when Loki recognized Thanos’s underling surging forward behind her, he knew he could not hesitate.

“Loki!”

Frigga’s cry of surprise was almost drowned out by the clash of metal on metal as Loki’s dagger stopped the scepter that would have stolen Thor’s mother’s will if not her life. The Other hissed, displeased.

“Do you question your loyalties again, son of Laufey?”

It was a calculated insult, and shook his confidence just enough to give the Chitauri leader a momentary advantage. He used it well- Loki staggered backwards, thrown.

“You will not hurt her,” he insisted, keeping his body between Frigga and the creature all but baying for her blood. Thanos’s underling, however, no longer seemed inclined to take instruction.

“We made no such agreement.”

His eyes glittered with dangerous intent.

“Perhaps we will take her, Trickster, and then the Gem, and then this world. Perhaps you are no longer of any use to Thanos.”

Loki and Frigga dove apart in time for Mjølnir to tear through the gap they’d made- the Other screamed in anger as he was driven back into the waiting ranks of Odin’s finest.

“Call yourself a strategist,” James Barnes muttered derisively, dragging Loki roughly to his feet as Thor helped Frigga up.

“I think you’re worse than Mussolini at choosin’ your friends.”

Loki had very little idea what that was meant to signify, but he clasped the boy’s hand with real feeling before looking almost shyly towards Thor.

“Thank you.”

Thor looked more shocked than gratified.

“Is that our Midgardian friend?”

Frigga smiled warmly at the captain.

“I should never have known you were not of this world, the way you fight.”

“High praise,” Loki murmured, ignoring the curl of bitterness that rose in his throat. It was true enough, and hardly the boy’s fault. All three of them were distracted by the dismayed cry that went up among Asgard’s shock troops. Thor strode forward, hammer at the ready.

“Sif! What is it?”

She looked up without a word- her battalion stood, thoroughly perplexed, around the empty space where the Other had once stood.

“What? How could he-”

“Look, there.”

Barnes was watching the horizon, white-faced for reasons that had nothing to do with his lasting dread of what Loki had done to him in that distant starscape.  Far beyond them, the Chitauri ships were blinking out of sight.

“They’re going back.”

Thor, ever hopeful for his friends, shook his shaggy head.

“What can they want with Midgard?”

In this aspect of combat, Loki knew too intimately, Barnes had far more experience than any on Asgard.

“They know they can’t win this. They want out, and without your goddamn tesseract the only way they know is the way they came.”

He looked to Thor first.

“We have to get back there before they do.”

Thor clenched his empty fist in frustration.

“We cannot risk the Bifröst.”

The captain nodded, understanding at once that opening a bridge between the two worlds would do very little to hold back the army they wished to contain.

“Captain, if I may be so bold-”

Frigga dipped the hand that wasn’t holding her broadsword behind her chestplate with an almost teasing look.

“Perhaps the ‘goddamn Tesseract’ may be of some use to you yet.”

Thor looked scandalized, but also in awe.

“I am not certain we can-”

His mother turned on him with all the fury of a woman who had gone to war by her husband’s side more times than even the balladeers knew.

“Do you question my loyalty, my wisdom, or both at once?”

Loki almost wished they had more time to spare: he would have liked to savour Thor’s flabbergasted look.

“Of course not! Mother, I-”

The captain arrested the argument by reaching between them to take the key, quite gently, out of Frigga’s hands.

“Tell her later, okay? We really have to get back there, big man.”

He looked to the queen.

“You’ll be alright here?”

Frigga laughed affectionately, answering as to a very young child.

“Am I the one of us who was blood-parched and insensible when we met?”

The captain rolled his eyes like an impetuous youth. Frigga, obviously charmed, turned to Thor with a mother’s tenderness.

“Go quickly, now. Your father will understand.” 

Before Loki could wonder what form of farewell Frigga would deem appropriate, she caught his chin and forced him to meet her eyes.

“Do not disappoint them a second time.”

Loki cringed, but nodded to show that he would try.

“My Lady, I-”

Frigga’s eyes were as kind as they had ever been, but she shook her head briskly.

“You may ‘tell me later’ as well. Finish what you started, Loki.”

Entirely unsure whether he was being offered a vote of confidence or warned that his crimes could not be erased, Loki turned his back on the woman who should have been his kin and followed her son and their Midgardian ally in the direction of Odin’s private chamber. It was too absurd- he could not have contained his sudden shriek of laughter if he had wanted to above all other things. Thor paused, plainly disturbed.

“What is it, then?”

“I would never have believed it. Asgard’s beloved prince flees the scene of battle to help Laufey’s bastard steal the Allfather’s-”

“Shut up,” Captain Barnes advised in the same low, unyielding tone he’d used once before.

“If we survive this you and I are going to have a good long talk about not antagonizing the only guys on hand who still want to help you, jeez.”

Thor was still contemplating allowing Mjølnir to speak on his behalf, Loki was sure, but Barnes turned to him with a different kind of appeal.

“Look, I really need to tell that girl I haven’t gone and died on her.”

“And that the Chitauri will return,” Thor reminded him, his manner already gentling. Barnes’ lips quirked up.

“I thought maybe we’d let this genius explain that part.”

Clearly, Loki thought wryly, the boy was not without a vengeful streak of his own.

* * *

Steph, still flanked by Clint and Tasha, was watching Richards gesture nervously at the screen set up between him and Phil Coulson when the air in front of her rippled like she’d only seen once before. She snatched the shield up from the table where it had been lying for days and went for Loki with enough force to take his monstrous helmet off his head before he realized she’d known he was coming. The gauntleted hands flailed, but Loki never even tried to get away. Steph found she didn’t like it.

“What, don’t you want to fight us now you have an army to do it for you?”

“Listen, Steph-”

She really didn’t need his help, not right then- not with this.

“Not now, Ant’ny.”

Maybe afraid that he was going to lose both of his father’s friends the same way, Tony reached out and grabbed the shield to _make_ Steph listen. She let go of it with a frustrated snarl, so quickly that Tony stumbled backwards at the unexpected loss of resistance. It wasn’t like that thing had ever been Steph’s only option in a fight: she had her Colt aimed at Loki’s chest before Tony found his balance. Sam, bless him, stepped in for Howard’s boy.

“Agent Barnes-”

“No,” she hissed, still staring Loki down. She hadn’t figured out his angle yet- the bastard could have been out of there by now, but he was still at her feet, one hand still half-raised as though to protect his face or chest. Somehow, Steph just couldn’t find it in herself to complain.

“I should have done this the first damned time around.”

She had been so focused on Loki that she didn’t realize anyone else had arrived with him until their alien chainmail glittered in her peripheral vision. Loki’s eyes flitted away from Steph’s for a second.

“Stephanie, the Captain-“

“Doesn’t get a goddamn say when he’s not even here.” Steph kept her eyes and her gun on Loki, leaving Clint and the others to handle whoever had come with him until the guy behind her spoke, gentle as a kiss and dangerously close.

“Easy, Rogers. We’re not that far gone yet.”

An endless eternity later, Steph realized all she’d done was take a single breath. She felt like her limbs had turned to lead. It had to be a trick, she decided, but knew she had to see him, just to know.

“Tasha, could you-”

There was a flash of light and a low buzzing noise, then Loki dropped heavily as though he’d been shot.

“All clear,” Agent Romanova announced, tucking her custom-voltage taser back into her utility belt.

“Go ahead, Agent Barnes.”

“Yeah,” the guy behind Steph muttered in her husband’s voice.

“I guess that’s one way to do it.”

After weeks of everyone she knew offering unsolicited comfort left and right, Steph was keenly aware that he was close enough to touch, but hadn’t yet. It would be just like her husband to want to wait until she was surer of him. Slowly, cautiously, Steph lowered her weapon and then turned her head.

“If you’re shamming-”

The corner of his mouth ticked up minutely.

“You’re gonna shoot me so many times, I know.”

“I was there,” Steph protested, so close to believing it was really him that she was terrified to trust herself.

“I _saw_ you-”

He tipped his head back just a little so she could see the ugly gash, mostly healed but still unmistakable, at his throat.

“His mam fixed it.”

He was watching her the way only Bucky ever had, careful and compassionate and fully prepared to trade everything he had to make her smile again.

“I’m so sorry, Stephanín.”

Only her stupid James would think he had to apologise for his own attempted murder. Steph choked on his name, swaying towards him as her vision swam.

“A Shéamais,” she tried again, then had to shut her eyes against a whole new kind of panic as she realised for the first time that she might never have had cause to say that out loud again.

“James. _James_ , my god-”

As soon as Steph reached for him Bucky put his arms around her.

“Hey,” he said, just quietly. Steph pressed her face into his shoulder with enough force to leave the impression of his borrowed armour in her cheek. She choked back a sob, barely processing anything beyond the fact that Bucky was _right there,_ somehow safe and strong and right where she wanted him.

“I’ve got you. You’re just fine, sweet girl.”

“Because you’re here.”

Steph had seen the alternative now, and she wasn’t sure she’d ever forget the more-than-bone-deep chill of it. She turned in his arms, leaning into his chest as she locked her hands around his wrists before he could cross them at her waist. 

“You’re not allowed out of my sight, understand? Ever again. I’ll cuff you to me if I have to.”

His voice was very fond, but she was sure he knew she wasn’t joking.

“Fine by me, Mrs. Barnes.”

And then Steph had to laugh, dropping Bucky’s hands to whirl back around and grab his shoulders, dragging him closer so she could kiss his face, messy and lightning-quick and everywhere she could reach, until he ducked away, bemused and a little exasperated but laughing too.

“ _What,_ Steph?”

“Is _this_ what we had to do for you to learn that? We’ve been married _five years_ , you stupid punk.”

He kissed her forehead first, because of course you could chuck James Barnes into space twice and he’d come home just the same and still a sap. Steph pulled away to scowl at him, and the idiot had the gall to wink at her flirtatiously before he gave in and kissed her the way a guy _should_ damn well kiss his wife after someone had nearly killed him right in front of her _again_. They stayed like that afterwards, just hanging on, until Tasha’s wry stage whisper broke the silence.

"It's hard to be sure, but I really think she believes him."


	17. when you come back, and you will come back

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> reaction, part 2: everyone says hi, and then Steph and Bucky actually get to talk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wrong half-chapter yesterday because I am bad at being a person. trying again now, not quite retcon more like straight-up rewrite except that I already had this version when I went with the other and am now sheepishly switching back. sorry am ridiculous will hopefully not happen again.  
> next chapter will be the proper one with actual plot developments.

“You don’t know how glad we are to have you back, Cap.”

That nickname still got to him, Steph thought: Bucky straightened up a little as he answered.

“Thanks, Barton. It's good to see you too.”

Bruce chuckled, making his way over to check on his patient one last time.

“You must be the only person in the world who talks to Tasha more casually than to Clint.”

They’d come a long way since their first meeting- the doctor didn’t even wait for permission to put one hand on Bucky’s shoulder and lift his chin. He looked more like a concerned father than a medical professional, Steph thought, but she was still relieved when he let go of Bucky with a satisfied nod.

“Almost good as new. Eventually you’ll have to tell me how they managed that.”

Bucky promised that he would, not that he knew much about it at all, then jerked his head towards Tony, who had yet to turn away from Loki.

“I think this is the longest I’ve ever been in a room with any guy named Stark without his tryin’a talk my ear off.”

Tony jerked around as though he couldn’t help it. Bucky sighed sympathetically as soon as he saw the haunted look on the poor guy’s face.

“Don’t, okay? It can’t be any more your fault than mine.”

Tony glanced at Steph as though he was expecting her to contradict her husband. There had been so much wrong, this last interminable while, but she’d never wondered whether Tony thought she blamed him for it.

“You didn’t know anything we didn’t,” she reminded him gently. He’d never asked them to do anything they hadn’t volunteered for, either.

“Thanks,” Howard’s boy said a little shakily. He took a breath and sounded much more like himself when he spoke again, waving an arm between Bucky and Thor to include both in his question.

“I take it at least one of you knows what Jack the Ripper here thought he was up to, then? I’m a bit surprised he’s still got all his appendages.”

He paused, considering.

“I mean, unless-”

“He gave me his word,” Bucky interrupted, smiling like he already knew his explanation wasn’t going to make a lick of sense. The way he talked up Loki’s multi-level gambit, Steph knew he thought it had been cleverer than it sounded insane, but not by much.

“The long and short of it is he really thought he was helping, you know? And he kept you guys out of it, at least.”

“That’s why he let you off,” Tony said to Thor.

“Sportsmanship: level up.”

“One level up from minus a thousand isn’t exactly a high score,” Clint muttered; Sam offered him a high-five out of fellow feeling.

“With help like this,” Steph grumbled, trying hard not to look at her husband’s poor ravaged neck. Bucky grinned at her still-watery scorn.

“Yeah, I decked him for it too.”

That story, Steph thought she might like to hear.

“I hope you made it count.”

“And how.”

Bucky stepped forward as soon as Loki spoke, ready to throw himself between Steph and the slightest hint of danger like he’d been doing since they were kids. Not for the first time, and probably not for the last, Steph elbowed him out of the way to speak for herself.

“There’s not gonna be a third time,” she said in a clear, even voice.

“I _ever_ see you look at him wrong, I’ll do it first and ask questions afterwards.”

Loki inclined his head, apparently taking Stephanie at her word. He looked her in the eye with a vulnerability she hadn’t seen since that SHIELD van what felt like months ago.

“I am truly sorry, Stephanie.”

She shook her head, grasped her husband’s hand in hers, and left the room without a word. After a moment, Loki gestured lazily at the veritable arsenal of Stark technology aimed at him from all around the room.

“Do I take it that this some kind of queue, or will the rest of you be taking your turn en masse?”

Normally it would have been Clint or Tony who spoke for the group, but Dr. Banner delivered their warning as coolly as if he were commenting on the weather.

“If you ever look at _either of them_ wrong again, this team will make you wish you’d taken your chances with the Chitauri. Is that clear enough?”

Loki held his gaze, then glanced towards Tony and the others to include them in his answer.

“Crystal.”

“Excellent,” Dr. Richards murmured; at some point, he’d left Stark’s team to their reunion in favour of monitoring the Chitauri. The hot spots he and Coulson had shown them earlier had been pale orange when Steph had turned her back on them. There were fewer now, but they were larger, and glowed a fiery red.

“If that’s settled, I think we should probably deal with the aliens sooner rather than later. Would someone like to check on the Captain and Mrs. Barnes?”

* * *

Bucky would have let his wife drag him all the way back to Brooklyn if it was what she’d wanted, but Steph turned to him almost as soon as they were in the hallway. Before he could say a word she pressed forward and kissed him hard. It was more insistent than enthusiastic, as if it were a test she had to pass or a fight she was determined not to let Bucky lose. She leaned into him as soon as she had let him up, one shaking hand still buried in his hair.

“I’m so sorry, J.”

That wasn’t, at all, what Bucky had been expecting her to say. He frowned, lacing his fingers together at her back.

“You wanna remind me what for?”

“I let him take you away again.”

She said the words heavily, like she was confessing the worst of mortal sins. Bucky frowned.

“You can’t think that’s on you. Steph, he was-”

“I promised I’d stop him,” she argued.

“Told you I’d keep you safe, and he still-”

“Don’t.” 

Bucky pressed his lips to her temple and then stayed there, speaking almost against her skin.

“We have, what, a couple handguns and a shield? He has magic, a chroí.”

Steph tried to nod but shuddered instead, pressing closer with a sigh that was nearly a sob.

“I’m supposed to look after you, though.”

Bucky closed his eyes for a second, wishing he could unmake the guilt in her voice. 

“Stephanie Maire,” he said sternly.

“You know damn well that all you’ve ever done, your whole life, is look after me.”

She smiled unsteadily, taking his left hand in both of hers.

“You really think we need his help on this.”

He really did, and she’d been right there hanging onto him when he’d told Tony why.

“If you don’t want to-”

“I can’t make nice with him,” Steph interrupted, lifting her head so she could watch Bucky’s eyes as she offered her terms.

“If you’re sure we can trust him I won’t get in his way, but I’m not gonna pretend I like havin’ him there.”

Bucky squeezed Steph’s hand as her gaze dipped briefly to his throat before reconnecting with his.

“I know what he did, and I don’t care why- I’m never gonna be his friend, okay?”

That seemed fair enough, Bucky thought, trying and failing to imagine himself agreeing to cooperate if he’d been the one left behind. When he said as much, though, his wife’s eyes narrowed as her lips thinned.

“If all you want from me is fair I’m gonna do what Tony said, cut off both his hands and maybe his-“

Bucky kissed her still-furrowed brow, then her cheek, and then her lips.

“That seems way too generous, I meant. Pushing the bounds of Christian charity. You sure you don’t want to hit him a couple times before Stark chucks him at the space aliens?”

Steph made a solid effort to keep her scowl in place.

“You better not be handlin’ me, James Buchanan.”

Her husband offered her the most innocent look he’d had to muster since he and Howard had tried to convince Peggy Carter that someone else had taken Stark’s experimental tank on a late-night test-drive.

“I’m sure I wouldn’t dare, Mrs. Captain, ma’am.”

They stared each other down, each determined to hold out longer, until Steph gave up and let her scowl collapse into a smirk.

“Goddamn charmer,” she muttered, pressing her lips to the corner of his mouth.

“I love you, you know that?”

“I do,” Bucky said softly, and Steph giggled in spite of herself.

“Sure you don’t mean ‘god, yes’?”

It had been years since anyone had brought that up. Bucky laughed out loud, tugging Steph closer so he could kiss her again.

“That too,” he grinned, but sobered a bit at the anxiety still lurking in her eyes.  

“You want me to tell Stark I can’t do this yet?”

Tony’s whole team was so cut up about how they hadn’t stopped Loki dragging Bucky off that he was pretty sure they’d almost rather he stay out of the next one, but it wasn’t something he offered lightly, and Steph knew that. She was quiet for a long moment, stroking his arm absently the way she mostly seemed to do when she was cataloging his injuries so she could torture herself with misplaced guilt later. Bucky bit back several oft-repeated protests and let her think. Eventually, Stephanie shook her head.

“Can’t let you do that,” she reported solemnly.

“You have to go where I go, right, and I just got done telling Tony I was gonna avenge you, so I guess you gotta come with.”

“Never been avenged before,” Bucky murmured thoughtfully.

“Am I allowed to help?”

He hadn’t thought avenging worked quite that way, but Steph wasn’t worried.

“It’s not one of your Roman deals. It’s my job-it works how I say it works.”

Her eyes dared him to contradict her.

“Great,” her husband said brightly.

“Let’s go avenge me, then.”


	18. it could happen to you

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> the Chitauri are back; unfortunately, so are the STRIKE team. Loki makes choices that surprise even him.

Bucky barely had time to reassure Stark’s team that he was fine, and would be fine, and did definitely want in on the action, before it was time for them to split up and head out. Dr. Banner raised just enough of a fuss to mollify Steph and leave her husband feeling like the youngest, still-injured member of George Henley’s crew all over again before Tony and Reed whisked him off to install whatever strange contraption they’d been working on in Bucky’s absence. That left Natasha in charge of the rest of them- or so Bucky thought until she held out a brand-new headset with a small, vaguely challenging grin.

“It’s your mission, isn’t it?”

Steph stumbled backwards like she thought the thing might bite her, letting Bucky take her weight when he put his arm around her waist to steady her.

“I’m not-”

“Sure you are.”

She just looked at him for a moment, thinking it over, then nodded sharply as she took the headset Natasha was still holding out.

“Can we get this guy his own as well?”

Clint was grinning so hard Bucky thought it must be hurting his cheeks.

“Are you gonna co-chair?”

“He _is_ the Captain,” Steph murmured, perfectly willing to share the assignment, but Bucky shook his head slightly.

“Everyone who’s ever known us knows you’re the boss, Rogers.”

She looked up sharply, abruptly reminded of the argument they hadn’t quite put to rest before Loki had snatched him right out of her grasp, but there was no trace of accusation in his expression. Steph took both his hands in hers, a remnant of childhood pacts vaguely inspired by Irish mythology.

“You _sure_ this is okay?”

“I’ve been tryin’a get them to put you in charge since 1943. C’mon, Agent Steph, time and space aliens wait for no man.”

They had some of those in the room already, Steph thought; she rounded on one of them without hesitation or compassion.

“I meant what I said. You try anything this time, you die- even if we have to chain you to a rock-face and have someone drip poison on you until Ragnarok.”

“How very Eddic,” Loki murmured, but Steph could see that she’d unnerved him with so specific a reference. They’d done their homework now, anyway, and it was just as well for Loki that he knew it.

“I, too, meant what I said. I will do what I must to make this right.”  
He sounded sincere, watching her eyes almost hopefully, but Steph had very little interest in making deals with the man who’d nearly killed her husband twice.

“Let’s go,” she said tersely, reaching for the shield someone had laid neatly against the coffee table.

“Let’s make them wish they’d never even heard of Earth, okay?”

* * *

Steph’s grim determination lasted just long enough to see her team to Central Park, at which point she was forced to confront the fact that the last time she’d been there was also the first time she’d had to watch her husband die. She turned to her boy, partly to make sure he was still there.

“Are you _sure_ you’re up for this?”

Bucky looked just like her own brave Captain, the more because he’d swapped that garish armour for the dark jacket Tony had obviously made with Howard’s original in mind, but Steph would never need anyone to remind her what her husband had been through since the last time he’d gone out with his Commandos.

“I go where you go, remember? Apparently it’s in my contract.”

He saw her hesitation and dropped the act, smiling quite sweetly.

“I’ll be fine. I’ve got my girl and I’ve got my gun- what else does a guy need, even?”

The last time he’d seen these monsters he’d been armed with someone else’s shield, and had only Thor to keep an eye on him. Steph felt her jaw tighten as her grip on Bucky’s arm grew more vise-like.

“A lick of goddamn sense,” she suggested.

“Don’t you dare get snatched again, understand?”

She’d half-expected him to click his heels mockingly, but even as a kid Bucky had never been one to promise more than he thought he could deliver.

“I’ll do my best, okay?”

Steph smiled.

“God knows that’s good enough for me, Cap.”

Thankfully he knew to kiss her, quick and sure, before he turned to Hawkeye with four questions in quick succession while Tasha assured Steph that their communications gear was all synched and good to go. Far above them, on the parapet of the building Stephanie had decided was her least favourite in New York, Johnny Storm’s mouth fell open.

“If Reed tried that before a fight I think I’d die of shock,” his sister muttered.

Her husband jerked at the sound of his name, but didn’t remove his head and upper limbs from two-thirds of the way into the machine Tony had built according to Erik Selvig’s specifications. The Human Torch grinned widely.

“If Reed ever tried that we’d have to stop the fight completely and make sure he wasn’t a Skrull or a Doom-bot or something.”

“Don’t ask,” Tony advised when Bruce cast an inquiring glance his way.

“With these guys it’s nearly always better to wonder than to know for sure. How’s it looking?”

It was looking pretty good, Bruce thought- they’d identified the epicenter of the oncoming attack, and if Reed’s calculations were correct they’d be able to close the rift almost as soon as it formed. Unfortunately nothing could be done to prevent it opening in the first place until Reed had more data on how that even happened, but the limits they were imposing should at least turn the unmitigated onslaught into a more manageable first wave of unfriendly aliens.

“Sir,” JARVIS murmured; Clint, on their open channel, was the first to respond.

“Yeah, I see it too. Here we go, guys.”

In no time at all, the swarming dark was upon them.

* * *

The Chitauri bore down on New York with an urgency that seemed completely new.

“They’re really going for it,” Johnny muttered, throwing a fire-ball to send one of the aliens careening into another before it could snap at the Falcon.

“I guess our new friend made them seriously mad this time.”

“We’re not sure he’s our friend yet,” Wilson reminded him, touching down on the roof to adjust his gauntlets.

“So far, so friend-like,” Johnny retorted with a grin, hugely enjoying the sight of Loki, self-declared bringer of chaos, irritably herding a group of awestruck teenagers to safety while Thor kept the Chitauri at bay from above.

“Let’s see how long it lasts this time,” Tasha muttered. Her voice was accompanied by the unmistakable hissing snap of her Widow’s Bite cuffs.

“That’s enough,” Stephanie cut in.  

“Less chatter on the line, please. Falcon: Hawkeye could use some aerial cover if you’re in the clear. Dr. Richards: how’re we doing?”

The team shaped up as one. Sam darted in to stop Clint from trying to face down three of the gruesome beasts on his own; Natasha arrived in time to even the odds. The distant crack of thunder signaled Thor’s continued well-being, which they were inclined to take as confirmation that Loki was still behaving too. From time to time, they heard the crash of vibranium on metallic alien hide, more often than not accompanied by a triumphant murmur and then Stephanie’s exasperated muttering about unnecessary risks.

“Alright,” Tony muttered as Reed pulled back at last.

“Here goes…definitely not nothing. Why do people even say that? Here goes maybe the most important thing we’re going to do today.”

Reed snapped the last piece into place, and Sue pulled the scientists back behind her protective force-field before Tony gave the command with relish.

The darkness receded so quickly that they were left blinking in the light as the Chitauri howled in angry confusion. For one long moment it really seemed like they had done it- but then the chasm opened all over again, many times wider than it had been before.

“What? No. No, JARVIS, what are you-”

Tony turned, sliding his faceplate back and schooling his resigned look into something more encouraging, as Bruce’s watch began to beep.

“Listen,” he ventured cautiously.

“It’s not that-”

“They got to Selvig.”

Of course Bruce would have put two and two together just as quickly as Tony had. The ominous thrumming increased in pace.

“We never even wondered. We just- and he-”

JARVIS set Tony’s jetboots in motion before he had time to think about it; it was the only reason he wasn’t knocked off his feet as Dr. Banner turned green and grew three sizes, much like the Grinch’s heart.

“I’ve just thought of a great analogy,” Tony muttered.

“Remind me to share with the class when we’re not-”

The Hulk grabbed the machine Tony had spent the better part of the week building and tore it apart in one wrathful movement.

“Gone,” the giant declared, satisfied, but then he craned his neck and glared accusingly at the sky before turning to Tony inquisitively.

“Why’re they still here?”

“Good question,” Steph muttered; she showed no sign of regarding the Hulk as any less of a teammate than his alter ego.

“You guys okay up there?”

“Mrs. Cap,” the Hulk murmured. Stephanie’s smile was evident in her voice.

“That’s me. You wanna get down here and help us break some other stuff?”

The Hulk, apparently overwhelmed by the startling lack of hostility from people other than Tony, Clint, and Tasha, stood uncertainly between two of the Fantastic Four and the edge of the building.

“Go on,” Tony suggested, mostly resigned.

“Have fun, break stuff. What the hell is SHIELD going to do about it in the middle of an alien invasion?”

The Hulk watched him soberly for another moment, then grinned and leapt from the building with uncanny lightness of foot. Johnny Storm whistled through his teeth, looping round so he could catch Ben’s eye upside down.

“How come you can’t do that?”

* * *

 

Some distance away, Thor grabbed Loki by the throat.

“What new betrayal must I appraise them of this time?”

Loki tried to shake his head, forcing what words he could past the restriction of his once-brother’s grip.

“Thor, I- I am- so sorry.”

Of course the Other could only have learnt of Selvig- and Jane Foster- from Loki’s mind. It had not occurred to him that the Chitauri would act on such knowledge without his say-so; he had not imagined that the Other could be so subtle, either. With a thrill of horror, Loki wondered whether that, too, might be a lesson he had never intended to teach. Thor seemed to sense the truth in Loki’s stricken look; he let go of him without further protest. He tilted his head, trying to speak into the headset Agent Romanova had already explained did not work that way.

“They will be in great danger. Stephanie, with your permission-”

“Go,” she said at once; of course she would be the last to stop a man from hastening to his likely-wounded love.

“Iron Man, can you take over up there on the left? Doc Richards, we could use you guys-”

Thor was already drawing away, preparing to swing the dreaded hammer and take himself away to Jane Foster and her friends. Suddenly at a loss as to what was expected of him, Loki found himself speaking harshly mostly by default.

“Am I to follow in your wake, like some-”

He fell silent when Thor shook his head.

“I will feel better knowing you are here. They fight bravely, but after all they are only Midgardian.”

His smile was indulgent, almost fatherly. With a start, Loki realised that Thor meant to leave him as guardian of his friends, rather than in their custody. For a moment, he was sure he had misunderstood- but Thor spoke as earnestly as he ever had. 

“Fight with honour, Loki.”

It was an ancient well-wish, deeply meant and far more generous than Loki would have dared to hope for from any of the race he had thought he had abandoned. He drew himself up as though physically accepting the unspoken challenge.

“I’m sure I need not say the same to you.”

The last he saw of Thor was the thunderer’s surprised, triumphant smile. Loki nodded to no one at all, then leapt at an approaching drone and felled it with a blow that was no less precise for being fairly savage in its execution.

“For Midgard,” he murmured, and chuckled at his own joke. He might have said something, perhaps asked the captain or his wife if they had any specific command he might follow, had the archer not distracted most of his team with a cry of disgust.  

“Coulson! What the hell are Rumlow’s guys doing here?”

The others gave a discontented murmur of agreement; the fighting went on as the matter was investigated. Loki killed another creature as it prepared to lunge.

“Evacuation,” the liaison reported presently; he sounded shaken even to Loki’s unaccustomed ear.

“SHIELD’s just received orders to end this fight by any means necessary. We’ve bee given an hour to clear the area.”

Stark gave an exaggerated groan.

“Why do I get the feeling this is going to end with missiles aimed at Central Park?”

“It better not,” Stephanie snarled. Loki smiled slightly, picturing the young woman making one improbable shot after another as her husband stood over her like a sentinel.

“I really hate missiles aimed at- Bucky! Get down, they’re gonna-”

They heard a skirmish, quick and brutal, before Barnes gave a cry of dismay which was in turn cut off by an ugly crackle of static. Loki took himself quickly towards the Captain, arriving to find the boy white-faced and wild-eyed, watching helplessly as a Chitauri charger bore his wife away. She’d seen it coming before him, Loki understood from the boy’s horrified face, and lunged to protect him the way he had the day he’d permanently damaged Loki’s preferred paradigm. Those who could react were already doing so- Stark and his fiery friend were racing towards Stephanie from above as Wilson did his best to join them from farther off. At first it looked like Stark would make it just in time, but when he raised a gauntleted fist the captain cried out in alarm.

“No! Listen, it’ll just-”

His warning came too late. The creature, enraged by the overhead attack, let go of its victim to bat away the unexpected nuisance. Stark gave a cry as he was flung away; by pure misfortune, he was thrown directly into the path of the Human Torch, sending them both careening out of range. Perhaps it was understandable: they were, as Thor had said, only human. Reaching for the forces Frigga had first taught him to marshal, Loki made his first ever conscious effort to use them for something other than pure mayhem.

He materialized overhead, snatching Stephanie out of the air and reappearing next to the captain. James caught his wife to his chest with something very like a sob, rocking her gently as they struggled to breathe normally.

“Stupid girl,” the captain rasped.

“Why would you ever go and-”

Stephanie smiled.

“I’m okay.”

Captain Barnes nodded against her neck, then pulled away reluctantly so he could look at her.

“We’re still in this thing,” Steph assured her husband, adopting the lilting drawl they still jokingly associated with her wartime persona.

“What say we get it over with so I can take you home at last, huh?”

Bucky smiled at last.

“You got it, kid.”

Loki found that he was smiling too. He turned away before it occurred to the boy to thank him for preventing that which he had almost inflicted on the couple more than once. As he did, his eyes lit upon a figure he had hoped never to see again. The Other, cloaked and bescythed like the Reaper of so many stories, was bearing down upon them with inhuman speed and strength. With startling clarity, and far less resentment than he might have predicted, Loki understood how he was going to die.

“See to them,” he snapped at Stark as Iron Man came tumbling to the ground to check on his father’s friends. He was gone again before Stark could retort that far better men than Loki had given them precisely that job many, many years before.


	19. gettin' together

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> things draw to a close, or something new begins.

“No, no, no. We are not doing this again.”

They were, though: there wasn't much Tony could do to stop Loki blinking out of sight, leaving the still-shaken captain and his wife with only Iron Man between them and the oncoming Chitauri.

“Goddamn coward, of course he’s gone as soon as it gets messy.”

“What else is new?”

Steph rolled her eyes expressively; Cap offered her and Tony a brief, tense smile before slinging a protective arm around his wife to keep her safely behind their shield.

“Whenever you’re ready, ace.”

Tony’s gauntlets whined, powering up, but then Steph cried out a warning as JARVIS broke off his countdown to engage thrusters and throw Tony upwards seconds before he would have been dragged to the ground. The Chitauri who had made a grab for him sunk its claws into the suit, yanking Tony several feet to the left before coming face to heavy-duty blasters with the full force of the suit’s artillery. The damage was done, though- by the time Tony got his bearings again the aliens had swarmed, forcing the captain and his wife towards their leader.

“Stark! Go left!“

Hawkeye had raced over from his position next to Tasha, adding his own firepower to Tony’s so they could plow their way through the alien ranks before the Chitauri leader sank teeth or claws into Bucky or his wife.

“Captain,” the alien leader hissed.

“You have cost us a valuable ally.”

“I’m not sure that’s my fault.”

He was almost frighteningly calm, Clint thought, considering the circumstances under which he’d last seen the alien. The Other, it seemed, had noticed too. It turned its gaze on Stephanie, sounding almost amused.

“He is less eager to die when your life is at stake as well.”

Neither the captain nor his wife gave the creature the satisfaction of any kind of response, but Bucky’s eyes slid sideways to make sure Steph was safely out of range before adjusting the angle of their shield.

“Any time, Stark!”

Tony’s repulsor blast hit the very centre of the shield his father had built, allowing the vibranium to absorb and concentrate the beam, turning it into a bolt of energy more powerful than anything the gauntlets could sustain independently. The Chitauri fell back in a confused cacophony of pain, leaving Stephanie free to step away from her husband long enough to help Clint mow down the row of aliens separating them. He reached her with a grin, and was on the point of offering verbal congratulations when Cap reached out and dragged them both to the ground with him.

“Get down,” he gasped belatedly.

“You too, ace.”

Tony dropped obediently, chest-plate scraping the ground milliseconds before a volley of projectiles took out all the Chitauri between them and at least half of those behind them. He swore violently, partially drowning out JARVIS’s nervous report that temperatures seemed to be dropping. Clint stared, uncomprehending, at the glassy spikes that seemed to have come out of nowhere.

“What’s-”

A second salvo raised a literal wall of ice, maybe eight feet high, all the way around the four of them. On the one hand, it solved their outnumbered-by-vicious-aliens problem in the short term- though possibly the very short term, given that it was already groaning under the force of a battle they could only kind of see unfolding on the other side. On the other hand, they were now _trapped in a little circle made of ice_ while an alien battle raged around them.

“Hawkeye, Iron Man, report- what’s your condition? Where are-”

“All present and intact,” Clint interrupted to assure Natasha, already wondering how long that would hold true.

“What the hell is going on out there?”

“Hang in there,” Johnny Storm yelled, confident in that bright, brash way that always made Clint feel like he must be nearer to retirement age than he wanted to think about.

“If this ice-guy thinks he’s got anything on the Human Torch, he’s-“

“Hold your horses, kid.”

That was Bucky, using the serene, authoritative tone Clint had heard Tony refer to as Cap’s Don’t Make Me Get the Rifle Out voice.

“I keep telling you guys, he’s on our side now.”

Stephanie’s sharp intake of breath masked another stream of cursing, this time from the Black Widow.

“Just to be clear,” Reed Richards murmured in his ponderous way,

“Are you saying that creature is Loki in another form?”

All they could see of him was the blurry outline of a figure that seemed to be knocking the stuffing out of the Chitauri leader, but Bucky nodded with a wry half-shrug.

“Stands to reason, doesn’t it? Everyone keeps telling us he’s secretly some kind of ice giant.”

“Frost giant,” Tony muttered; Thor had explained the difference many times and at great length.  

“No one ever told us he could do _this_.”

The captain’s expression was speculative.

“He doesn’t know that much about this stuff- maybe this is him finding out.”

Stephanie shook her head, watching Cap intently as if trying to discover injuries he hadn’t reported yet.

“I wish he’d thought of it _before_ they almost killed you twenty times.”

“More like four,” Bucky demurred, elbowing her playfully.

“And I’m fine, Steph, plus this way we can be pretty sure he’s not gonna start pointing those things at us.”

Clint shuddered; the Champions had had more than enough trouble with Loki in full villain mode without having to contend with anything like this. Steph sighed, pressing a hand to her husband’s cheek in a moment of pure, helpless tenderness.  

“Poor Bucky, you really don’t remember what ‘fine’ looks like anymore, do you?”

It was plainly obvious that she meant it as part of a larger conversation, one in which Clint and Tony- to say nothing of the other six people listening in remotely- had no part. Before Bucky could say anything, though, his gaze turned sharp again. The shadows which had been dancing back and forth in front of their icy shield were suddenly looming much larger than before.

“Watch out, they’re gonna-”

They did, so quickly that Clint would probably have been crushed where he stood if Tony hadn’t grabbed him around the shoulders and lifted him straight up into the air and out of the way. The other two, unable to take to the air to escape the danger zone, were pressed back against the icy wall that had so recently seemed more like an asset than a sure way to end up at the end of an alien pike. They were, of course, hanging onto each other and arguing in low voices about who should take which risk for the other’s sake.

“Shit,” Clint muttered, knowing they had to do something but barely able to do more than hang onto Tony’s too-smooth metal suit as they both watched the Other bring his weapon down with deadly force. This time, though, the captain and his wife weren’t fighting alone.

“You will _not_ harm them again.”

It really was Loki, Clint realized- the frost giant’s voice was a rough growl, echoing and resonant instead of crisp and clear, but his signature blend of bored entitlement and almost fearful defiance was as distinct as a fingerprint. In this form, the Jotunn heir stood nearly two heads taller than Cap, which made Clint feel a lot better about the fact that Loki was the only thing standing between the other two and a creature that had been trying to kill them with almost as much enthusiasm as Johann Schmidt in their previous life. When Bucky flung his shield and Stephanie took down two oncoming Chitauri before they could try to rush Loki, Tony sent Clint down so they could do their bit to even the odds as well. Loki himself fought much as he always had in Clint’s experience, fast and dirty with an edge of desperation that made his every move all the more unpredictable. It was over very quickly in the end- about five minutes into this second stage of the fight Loki leapt, twisting as he lunged, and pinned the Other to the ground even as an icy dagger materialized in his hand as though at his will. Disturbingly, the alien at his mercy gave a harsh bark of laughter.

“The Trickster shows his true colours at last. We are surprised, Son of Laufey, that you would risk everything you have been promised for the sake of these pathetic creatures.”

“That’s nice,” Stephanie drawled in a low voice, not at all impressed. Her husband shot her a cautioning look, edging closer in case she provoked a physical reaction. Loki ignored the interruption, planting his feet firmly as he pressed his knife to his opponent’s throat.

“I care very little what you think of my motives.”

The Chitauri leader struggled in his grip, letting out a frustrated hiss.

“What can you hope to achieve by this? Thanos will destroy you all.”

Loki went so far as to mime an exaggerated yawn.

“He would not waste his time. As I have said before, Midgard is of very little significance in the greater scheme of things.”

“Yeah,” Tony muttered for the benefit of the group.

“That’s definitely Loki.”

The Other looked as disbelieving as a creature could whose face seemed like it could have been modelled in wet clay.

“Do you forget the infinity gems?”

The frost giant rolled its eyes.

“He will not find those _here_.”

The Chitauri commander hissed wrathfully.

“Then you betray our Master to serve those barely fit to be his slaves.”

“You may suppose I do.”  

It was over in seconds. The creature thrashed wildly; Loki’s knife flashed with deadly purpose. Mere moments later, the Other was dead, and a thousand ghastly heads turned beacon eyes and razor teeth towards the hand that now held the scythe their commander had always used to direct them.

“Oh, here we go.”

Clint got no other warning before he was lifted off his feet again, Tony setting him down so that the two of them stood shoulder-to-shoulder between Loki and the couple Barnes. Iron Man gave no sign at all of being intimidated by the frost giant’s relative size or strength- if anything, Tony sounded deeply annoyed.

“Let me guess: this is your army now, and all bets are off. Again.”

Loki looked right over their heads to address Bucky instead.

“Captain, I-”

The rest of the sentence was lost along with its speaker as the Chitauri swarmed.

“Apparently they’re _not_ his army,” Mr. Fantastic observed neutrally. Tony threw his hands up in a gesture Clint immediately recognized as meaning “ _thank_ you, Captain Obvious.” Stephanie shot her husband a sideways glance and sighed long-sufferingly when she realized that he was already deciding on an angle of attack. 

“Cap thinks we should get his pal here out of this jam,” she reported. Her husband batted his eyelids at her.

“Could we please, darling, do you think?”

“Fine,” his wife decided, not quite reluctantly.

“Since you asked nicely. Stick with the shield, okay? I don’t like you goin’ out with a gun while you still have double vision.”

“Tyrant,” Bucky murmured, entirely affectionate. They turned as one to pursue the alien horde; Clint fell into step with them as Iron Man shot upwards to follow overhead.

“Do you often go out with a gun while you still have double vision?”

“Don’t encourage him,” the Black Widow snapped; Steph nodded emphatically even though it wasn’t at all clear which of them Nat had been warning off.

“Encourage him later,” Tony amended cheerfully. A little too cheerfully, even- Clint had been working with Iron Man long enough to know when his sometimes-boss was nervous.

“In the meantime I think we’ve got about 20 minutes on Nick Fury’s clock before this whole thing ends in tears, and by tears of course I mean a government-sanctioned nuclear explosion.”


	20. is this worth fighting for

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> several people fight for causes they didn't think were theirs; Tony, on the other hand, finds himself going back to basics and thinking mostly of his dad.

The part of Loki that had always been the Trickster- craft and wile bound together by his foster-mother’s magic- had been screaming for agency from the moment the Chitauri had swept him off, but it was only when the fury of the frost giant was fully awakened that Loki’s feet found purchase amidst the swarm. The creatures were strong and deadly, but no match for a Jotunn prince newly aware of his abilities. Loki reared the head he had never quite dared to study for any length of time and let his instincts lead him to bloody victory. It was not wholly unlike fighting in his preferred form- he still favoured close combat, and relished an easy kill- but the weapons were of his own creation, appearing in his hand seemingly as he envisioned them, and the fighting was fierce and brutal in a manner that seemed more typical of Volstagg or his kin. Very quickly Loki carved himself a clearing among the Chitauri mass; he was just at the point of wondering how long he could defend it when three of the great beasts leapt together for his neck. The frost giant ducked and twisted, but three of them was plenty even for him- Loki snarled viciously as two of the creatures weighed him down with dull-witted patience as the third prepared to tear out his throat.

It never found its mark- the creature fell, shrieking and thrashing, as the captain’s shield met the side of its head with ruthless precision. It was knocked sideways, but recovered quickly. Loki tried in vain to free himself in time to assist, but he had barely got one arm free when the creature crashed to the ground a second time and lay still.

“Thanks,” the captain grinned at his wife, handing her their shield so he could offer Loki a hand up as if it were perfectly commonplace for him to hold out his hand in friendship to a frost giant the likes of which had never yet been seen on Asgard.

“Still in one piece there?"

Loki nodded dumbly, staggering to his feet and wondering at the boy’s complete lack of reaction to his Jotunn form. Stephanie made a commendable effort to pretend she had no idea he was there at all, concentrating on whoever was addressing her through the headset her husband must have given her after her own met its end in the fall from which Loki had delivered her.

“Thor’s on his way back,” she told her husband tersely. Loki felt himself tense, but neither the captain nor his wife so much as glanced his way. Instead, both looked towards the tower from which they had made their first attempt against the Chitauri. 

“Dr. Foster’s with him. They have a plan, if only we can get them enough power. Tony thinks he can rewire the lights, maybe, but it might take longer than we have.”

“There’s always the-”

“ _Don’t_ suggest the blue and glowing cube thing,” Stephanie interrupted; her husband smiled even as he conceded the point.

“Yeah, that never ends well for anyone, does it.”

He raised a pistol Loki had not realized he was holding and cut down a lurking Chitauri before the beast could threaten their small group.

“Captain,” the trickster ventured, then scowled at the sound of his lowered voice. He closed his eyes, focusing on the question of form, then tried again.

“Captain, perhaps the mindstone will answer. I do have some idea of how to wield it.”

He had never yet seen it “melt anyone’s face off,” he meant. Stephanie touched her husband’s arm when he shuddered- either at the mention of the gem itself or at the memory of the first time it had been used against him.

“Bucky-“

“I’m okay,” the captain assured her, bending to retrieve the staff Loki had let fall in the struggle. 

“This goddamn thing,” he muttered, considering it carefully- then stilled as a strange red glow found the centre of his chest. Both Loki and Stephanie looked up to find the soldier they had first encountered in Stark’s own home staring them down with his rifle trained on the captain.

“Put down the scepter, Barnes.”

His wife took a step forward, making sure she and the shield were between her husband and the man most recently inclined to threaten him.

“Captain Barnes, I told you. What the hell is your problem now?”

“Look,” the STRIKE agent said, striving and utterly failing to give the impression of long-suffering rather than dogmatic bullying.

“I can’t let you help a known agent of-”

“I’ll help whoever’s trying to stop your bosses from blowing a hole in the city,” Stephanie snapped.

“You wanna back off so we can get on with that while there’s still time?”

The agent who had helped them earlier spoke over the open channel of SHIELD’s area-wide communications.

“Stand down, Agent Rumlow. We’re all on the same side here.”

SHIELD had, in fact, joined the Avengers in their struggle at some point between Stephanie’s near encounter with gravity and Loki’s reappearance in the form to which he had been born, but Rumlow only tightened his grip on the rifle in his hands.

“I don’t think so,” he snarled, eyes on the dagger already glittering in Loki’s hand.

“Back off, Coulson. I’ve been waiting a long time for-“

When the dull crash of thunder that signaled Thor’s return distracted their would-be attacker, the captain wasted no time tossing the scepter in Loki’s direction.

“Go,” he said simply; the trickster caught the mindstone’s vessel smoothly, nodded once to show he would obey, and was gone.

* * *

“I knew it! You _are_ working for him.”

Rumlow leapt at Bucky as if he’d forgotten he was holding a rifle instead of a spear, but Stephanie didn’t wait to see how her husband would react. She raised the shield quickly to the right, taking the gun right out of Rumlow's hands, and then brought it down over his shoulders without a second’s hesitation. Her first blow winded him beyond retaliation; the second left him down for the count.

“Leave him _alone_ , I said.”

“Damn,” Clint breathed over the comms.

“Way to go, Agent Barnes.”

“I did warn him,” Steph pointed out, trying not to sound defensive- in the heat of the moment she'd forgotten anyone but Bucky was even paying attention. Flustered, she avoided her husband's eyes as he took back their shield so she could relieve Rumlow of his rifle.

“I swear the army used to teach these guys how to follow goddamn orders.”

Steph was half expecting her husband to retort that she, for one, had never really learnt that at all, but he just grinned and slung his arm around her. The edges of their shield dug into her back as he drew her closer so they could share a private smile.

“Mrs. Barnes,” Bucky murmured, too low for Tony’s mic to pick up his voice.

“You are fantastic, you know that?”

“I try,” Steph grinned, feeling better immediately. She cocked her head, watching the creatures gathering behind him.

“They’re coming in low on your left.”

Bucky nodded, taking a step back so he could brae himself properly without getting in her way.

“Watch your four.”

They moved together- she hung onto his arm as she took aim, mowing down the three aliens on one side of them while Bucky angled their shield expertly. He leapt after it as soon as he was sure Steph no longer needed him at her back- she kept the creature in her sights as her husband went for it, just in case, but it crashed to the ground and showed no sign of trying to rise. Bucky turned to wink at her, the way he had sometimes done when she had been spotting one of his infiltration jobs from a distant hilltop. Because they weren’t separated by a couple hundred yards, and because she could never think about the Alps without wanting to drag him home and hide him away until someone promised that Schmidt was dead and gone, Steph stepped right back into Bucky’s personal space and pressed her lips to his.

“You good?”

“Better now.”

“Impressive,” Natasha declared, making both of them jump.

“Hardly even broke form.”

“My Dad used to talk about that," Tony told them all cheerfully.

“I always assumed it was nostalgia making you two sound so damn smooth.”

“It wasn’t,” Bucky assured Howard’s son. He looked so honestly pleased, and so secretly smug, that Steph found she had very little choice about kissing him again before she took his hand and tugged him along after her.

“Hush,” she ordered the lot of them.

“We’re on our way, Tony. Can we get an update on the whatsit machine?”

* * *

Reed looked up with interest.

“Will the Captain and Agent Barnes be joining us at last? I’ve been dying to see their-”

“Say ‘DNA' at your own risk,” Iron Man advised. The Hulk, on duty keeping the Chitauri well away from Jane and the others, rumbled darkly behind him.

“-Shield in motion,” Mr. Fantastic finished curiously.

“But now I also want to hear the DNA story.”

They jumped apart as a low hedge of flame leapt up between Richards and the other two.

“Reed! Stark! Big Scary Dr. B! Stop the giant claw-beasts, close the hole in the universe,  _then_  resume the broship of the geeks reunion show!”

It was a fair point, they had to concede; the Hulk took a running leap at one of the aliens in his peripheral vision and gave a booming laugh of appreciation as it fell quickly and permanently out of reach of Dr. Foster’s machine.

“I like that kid,” Agent Thirteen told her ex-partner, using carefully-placed pistol-shots to guide one of the aliens into position for Sam to drop a piece of debris from overhead, knocking it out.

“When Stark comes to his senses and trades the archer in for a newer model you should make sure he asks for Johnny Storm.”’

“Oh, so  _now_ you want in on my new gig.”

She raised an eyebrow, aiming for playfully assertive instead of trying to apologise for her choice.

“Are you complaining?”

For one tense moment she thought he was going to leave her hanging, but then Sam grinned.

“Yes. It’s not like you to be this late to the party, Carter.”

Sharon smiled, recognizing the olive branch for what it was.

“Just giving your team the appropriate head-start, Wilson.”

The Falcon gave a gleeful whoop, diving past Agent Thirteen as he chased another alien towards Tony and his repulsors.

“Oh, it’s _on.”_  

Some distance away, Bucky raised an eyebrow at Natasha’s deadly look.

“Do they know you’re still on their channel?”

She shrugged disinterestedly- it couldn’t be her fault if SHIELD had neglected to take the Black Widow off their call list after her departure.

“One of my knives has been strangely slippery recently,” she remarked casually, slicing into a claw-beast of her own before she took aim at another. However slippery her grip, her aim was true- the creature fell with Natasha’s throwing knife buried to the hilt in its neck. Bucky was sure Agent Carter would never even realize she had been the next closest warm body in Tasha’s line of sight.

“It’s a problem,” he agreed, flinging the shield and smirking when another alien crashed to the ground. It was almost too easy fighting the lumbering idiots without anyone in charge of them- Bucky would have felt bad, maybe, if they hadn’t already shown their willingness- eagerness even- to kill him, his wife, most of their living friends and quite possibly everyone on both Earth and Asgard.

“Listen, you wanna-“

Somehow Natasha parsed the suggestion; she nodded readily, stepping up confidently when Bucky held out the shield. He was able to lift her far enough to make the jump herself- Bucky whistled through his teeth as Natasha knocked one of the alien chargers clean off its perch.

“Brilliant,” she grinned, turning in mid-air on the weaponised bike.

“Thanks, old man.”

Bucky rolled his eyes and threw the shield again.

“If you two ever decide to team up,” Agent Barnes warned him over her shoulder, “I’ll come break you out of jail- again- but I’m not doing any of your paperwork. Ever.”

“Kiss your wife later,” Natasha ordered before Bucky could reply. She was grinning at the pair of them from overhead, pointing imperiously as soon as they made eye contact.

“Go hit that black one before it spits at Thor. There’ll be no paperwork in any case- it’s Stark’s operation now.”

“You I might leave in jail,” Steph grumbled. Moving almost too quickly to follow, she took out both the alien she’d already had in her sights and the one Natasha had been about to go for.

“I’ve got this, go check on Barton or something. We’re already married, James- how did we end up with six chaperones?”

“I think Steph just called us cockblocks in 1940s-speak,” Clint reported. Natasha grinned, but made no reply. Cap, already busy subduing the alien Natasha had singled out, shook his head with a grin as he severed the alien’s thick spines with precise blows of the shield.

“More like six teenage children, a chroí. God have mercy. Do we know how Stark’s doing?”

* * *

He was doing pretty damn well, if JARVIS was to be believed- Tony had never been religious, but he was more than prepared to thank the god his father’s friends seemed so sure of for Jane Foster and her _working prototype._

“I can’t believe you made one of these,” Tony marveled. He’d never in his whole life made more than a detailed drawing before moving into the construction phase- and he’d never, ever, made a duplicate copy “just in case.” Jane Foster laughed, tossing her head self-consciously even as she watched Reed make his adjustments without even blinking at his elasticized arms.

“I get government funding,” she explained dryly.

“There are certain minimum requirements.”

Tony and Reed exchanged a baffled glance; they returned to their work no further enlightened but with a renewed awareness of their respective family resources.

“We have minimum requirements,” Tony grumbled, not quite competitive. He might have said more, but he was distracted by Agent Coulson, voice taut as he requested access to the Avengers’ private comms.

“I’m sorry,” their one-time handler said by way of greeting. The powers that be had started countdown to the scheduled missile launch, and not even Fury could do anything to stop them now.

“Understood,” Steph said shortly, which was much friendlier than what Tony had been about to say.

“How long do we have?” 

“I’m sorry,” Coulson said again.

“Five minutes and counting.”

As Sam’s headset picked up the echo of Agent Thirteen’s alarm, Dr. Foster eyed her creation nervously.

“I’m almost sure it’ll work if we just go with it.”

“That’s quite an almost,” Reed told her mildly- but he didn’t stop work, and none of Tony’s friends showed any sign of slowing down.

“Get it done, Ant’ny.”

Tony found himself grinning.

“Roger, Rogers.”

“Jeez,” Steph grumbled under her breath.

“It’s like it’s 1944 all over again, except there are fewer Nazis now.”

“Now’s better,” the Hulk offered, surprising everyone by trying to engage. Stephanie laughed.

“Can’t argue with that, Doc.” 

The giant grinned, and was still grinning when Dr. Foster stood back, nodding.

“Might as well,” she decided, waving Loki over. If they’d had five minutes, Tony thought, he could have spared one to contemplate the irony of relying entirely on Thor’s so-called brother at this late, late stage in the game.

“You know what to do?”

The trickster rolled his eyes.

“Certainly as much as-”

"Great," Stephanie cut in.

“Shut up and do it, then.”

Tony grinned widely behind his faceplate at Thor’s scandalized expression. Loki only inclined his head before bringing the scepter he’d been keeping safe for them sweeping down into position where Jane had asked for it. For a moment it looked like nothing had happened- then the scepter began to glow brightly, and Jane’s prototype whirred to life.

“Got it,” Tony breathed as JARVIS confirmed all systems go.

“Guys, this is it.”

The reaction on the ground was immediate- every alien head turned as one towards the rapidly narrowing gap between the Chitauri and the ships in which they had arrived.

“Bucky,” they heard Stephanie say in an undertone as the creatures began to gather in greater numbers.

“Stay with me, Cap, okay?”

He didn’t answer, but she didn’t say anything else, so Tony had to assume they were okay. The aliens rose in unsteady black swirls, reminding Tony strangely of the iron dust he’d pushed around with a magnet as a child in his father’s lab.

“C’mon,” he heard himself growl- letting anyone else dictate the pace of things had never really been Tony’s style. He took to the air, herding the beasts enthusiastically with strategic blasts of his repulsors. Thor, he could tell from the crackle of lightning in the middle distance, had been doing much the same as soon as it had become an option.

It was much, much easier to direct the aliens now that they were all agreed on the direction in which they wanted to go- in very little time, they were watching, somewhere between awed and plainly exhausted, as the bright expanse of mid-afternoon sky was restored. Tony wondered what the roaring in his ears could be- he hadn’t even been in free-fall, this time- and realized that it was the combined cry of SHIELD’s agents on the scene and a good portion of New York’s own inhabitants shouting out in relief, admiration and thanks.

“Huh. Good job, guys.”

“Just like that,” Stephanie muttered, and Tony laughed out loud.

“That’s some ‘just,’” he grinned, echoing Reed; the astronomer smiled in recognition, but then frowned at the viewscreen on which he’d been monitoring Jane’s progress.

“I would have thought they’d have called off the missile launch by now.”

Tony’s blood ran cold.

“What? JARVIS-”

Their sensors said the same- and so did SHIELD’s. The missile had been launched- though no one seemed to know why or by whom.

“Not good,” Clint summarised, already moving towards his fellow ground support. He found both Cap and Steph studying the bike they’d helped Natasha commandeer earlier.

“If Stark knows how to shut it down we could-”

“You could not,” Clint cried severely.

“Stand down, Cap- this is _not_ that kind of deal.”

It really wasn’t- but it was just like them to want to try. For the first time in his life, Tony thought how odd it was that he knew enough about James and Stephanie Barnes to know that when he’d only known them for about four months in real life.

“Twenty-five,” he muttered- no wonder Howard had always talked about them like they were practically teenagers. Dr. Foster looked confused.

“Twenty-five of what?” 

“Years,” he said, suddenly choked up. It was less than half the time they’d been under the ice- _no wonder_ Howard had been so grateful towards the end for Tony’s assurance, given freely as often as his father had seemed to need to hear it, that they’d keep looking, dad, okay? Tony squared his shoulders and keyed JARVIS’s instructions in by hand so no one else would have time to react.

“Look, could you open that portal again if you had to?"

She looked wholly startled, but nodded uncertainly.

“If I _had_ to.”

“Great,” Tony beamed. He was really, really hoping they wouldn’t have to, but if he’d learnt anything during the alien invasion it was that it paid to have a back-up plan.

“I’ve got this,” he announced in the coolest voice he could muster. SHIELD was watching, after all- let Fury see for himself whether Stark could be a team player or not.

“Let someone else take one for the team for once, Cap, okay?”

He was already airborne, and he _was_ their engineer- if anyone should attempt to disarm a missile already in mid-air it should be him. Clint disagreed vehemently- which, to be fair, was not that unusual.

“Stark! Get your ass back here. What part of ‘stand down’ sounds like-”

“I can do this,” Tony insisted, repelled by the tremour in his voice but not at all sure how to get rid of it.

“You guys just stay clear if this goes wrong, okay? Keep your finger on that button, New Mex.”

She was already promising that she'd do what she could, but Tony wasn’t sure anyone fully understood why he wanted her to do it until Stephanie realized his intentions.

“That’s a one-way trip, Ant’ny.”

She wasn’t trying to talk him out of it, just making sure he knew the risks. She hadn’t smacked her husband silly for making the suggestion in the first place, either- and Bucky had said ‘we’ like he knew she’d want to be there with him.  

“Yeah, well. They must have told you guys that too, right?”

Tony shut off his headset before she could answer, not least because he wasn’t at all sure he could go through with Plan B if he had to listen to his friends’ reaction.

“I’ve got this,” he said again, mostly for his own benefit. JARVIS cleared his throat, leaving Tony weak-kneed with relief at the reminder that he wouldn’t have to be _entirely_ on his own.

“Sorry, JARVIS. We’ve got this, I mean.”

“Let’s hope so, Sir.”


	21. ride, red, ride

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tony's effort at the sacrifice play is somewhat stymied by his stupid team's steadfast refusal to just let him do it already.

“There’s no time,” Stephanie fretted, watching fearfully as Tony sped towards the missile he could not hope to disarm. “Bucky, we can’t just let him-”

“No.”

In hindsight it would make perfect sense, but the team reacted with unconcealed shock when Cap turned to Loki as a first resort. “You can handle a bomb, right?”

He couldn’t be sure Loki had ever even seen a bomb close up, but the trickster gave a dismissive shrug that was very close to convincing.

“A trifle,” he assured them. Cap seemed willing to take him at his word, but he also caught Thor’s eye over Stephanie’s shoulder as the thunderer landed neatly among them.

“You’ll go with him?”

“Certainly. Brother- come!”

Thor swung his hammer to take to the air again; Loki rolled his eyes, much more like a put-upon teenager than like a would-be god, but seemed surer of himself as he offered the captain a rueful kind of smile before whispering out of existence. Steph, having more than caught on, handed Bucky her headset so he could update Drs. Richards and Foster on their next move. While he was busy, she waved over the last two elements of their immediate plan.

“Doc! You wanna take Johnny here and get our Tony back before he does anything we can’t fix? We’ll catch up.”

The huge green head bent low as the Hulk considered the young woman who kept presuming to tell him what to do.

“Shellhead won’t like it,” he told her, frowning. Stephanie frowned right back.

“He’ll like getting blown to pieces a lot less. If he gives you any trouble you tell him to pipe down and take it up with me after, okay? We’ve got two minutes, Doc.”

The Hulk’s menacing scowl melted into a brief, toothy grin before he bounded away, gathering speed as he went. Johnny de-flamed just long enough to throw his arms around his sister, very briefly; Sue barely had time to murmur his name, touched and surprised, before he was shooting towards the others, muttering to himself about how aerial powers were the absolute worst but showing no signs at all of wishing he’d declined the role Cap and Steph had picked for him.

“See?"

Bucky shared an anxious, hopeful look with his wife before they joined Natasha and Clint in the mad dash Tony-wards. “We’ve definitely got this.”

* * *

On their own above the city Tony's team had long sworn to protect, Tony and JARVIS had more or less agreed that they were out of ideas.

“45 seconds,” the AI murmured, as nervous as he was capable of sounding. Tony, who was so far past frantic that he mostly felt resigned, found himself breathing out with something disturbingly like relief when he saw another swirling stab wound begin to open in the sky.

“Right,” he muttered. It didn't even feel like giving up, somehow- if something was their only option, he was sure his dad had said at least a couple of times, then it was by definition the best option. “I guess that’s our cue, JAR.”

He hadn’t even fired his thrusters yet when Loki appeared directly in front of him, smiling like a shark.

“Wrong,” he said cheerfully. “Away with you, mortal.” 

He gave Tony’s chestplate a single, almost playful shove- it shut the suit down entirely.

“What the- _what_ -”

He hadn’t even decided which curse words would be the last he ever said out loud when he was tackled sideways by a too-warm blur that could only be the Human Torch.

“Gotcha,” the younger Storm grinned, not particularly worried about the fact that they were still careening towards the earth at more than deadly speed.

“Are you crazy? Kid, we really have to-”

“Relax,” Johnny grinned, and let go just in time for two vivid green arms, thick as tree-trunks and twice as solid, to pluck Iron Man right out of the air.

“Bruce! Put me down. This is-”

The Hulk gave him a gentle shake by way of reprimand, making Tony’s teeth feel like they were rattling in his head.

“Pipe down, shell-head.”

They crashed to the ground the way Bruce usually did in this form, leaving a crater Tony had no bandwith at all to even think about. He lay where he had fallen, winded, disoriented, and more than weighed down by the huge green hand still pinning him to the asphalt.

“Great job, guys.”

That was Steph, already leaning over Tony and tugging at something he couldn’t see. The Hulk let go of him to help her- a moment later they had freed Tony of his helmet, leaving Steph to drag him roughly into a fierce, grateful hug. “What the hell are you saying, ‘take one for the team?’ We have a goddamn _alien magician_ here, you jackass.”

Tony opened his mouth, then shut it again because he honestly hadn’t thought of that. Steph still had both arms around him- he glanced around them reflexively as he hugged her back just in case something had gone wrong, but Cap was standing just a few feet away, watching the sky with the steady, assessing gaze of a chess player waiting to see how his last play of the game would work out.

Overhead, Loki shot much further into the great unknown than Tony would have been able to manage once his thrusters gave out in the absence of oxygen. The missile itself was only slightly more suited to deep space than Tony’s suit- JARVIS’s relentless countdown ended abruptly in the middle-teens. Before Reed or Coulson could corroborate their readings, Thor brought Mjølnir crashing down. Stephanie drew a ragged, surprised breath as the missile splintered into a thousand harmless shards which hung, suspended ‘among the stars,’ until Loki waved his hands and reduced them to dust.

“Oh,” Tony said quietly. “Yeah, that was a lot easier than what I was going to try.”

Stephanie snorted, not even bothering to reply; Cap shot him a look that was deeply affectionate and totally unimpressed at the same time.

“You think?”

People had started cheering again- overhead, the sky was clearing for what Tony fervently hoped would be the final time in this context. There was a staticky boom, close-ish by: a second later, Thor and Loki were earthbound again. Before anyone could say a word, the Hulk thumped Loki heavily on the back.

“Not bad, puny god.”

Steph looked rebellious, but chose not to comment. Her husband grasped Loki’s arm with sincere affection.

“Thank you,” he said simply; the some-time frost giant offered him the least pretentious smile Tony had ever seen on his face.

“I did give you my word.”

Loki’s eyes flicked over the team that had gathered around Tony, taking in their mingled looks of surprise, suspicion and reluctant gratitude, before they returned to the captain’s steady gaze. “I find I would like for that to have some worth one day. In suit of which-“

He gave Bucky a quick, decisive nod, then turned and held both wrists out towards Thor as if he thought the Thunderer had a pair of handcuffs hidden somewhere in that cape of his.

“Prince of Asgard, I surrender.”

Thor stayed rooted to the spot, eyes wide and mouth half open. Loki never even tried to comment on it. 

“Your friends find meaning it searching for justice even in an imperfect system,” he said instead. “I am not as opposed as I once thought to doing the same.”

He was very calm, especially for Loki.

“I would atone for what I’ve done.”  

It was entirely possible that they’d just have stayed like that, indefinitely locked in some kind of otherworldly stare-off, if Bucky hadn’t clapped Loki on the back in brisk, deeply approving solidarity.

“Good for you,” he said quietly. “Say hi to your mam for me.”

Cap gave Thor a bright, bracing kind of grin- Tony saw the thunderer’s shoulders lift with renewed energy and wondered vaguely what unspoken message had been passed between the two veterans in that long look.

“Tell them he did good today,” Bucky suggested. “Unless they know already, I guess, since you have that gatekeeper who-”

Thor cut him off by dragging him into crushing hug; Cap only looked taken aback for a second before he grinned and thumped Thor’s shoulder agreeably. Stephanie, who had been staring Loki down the way she did any time he was within ten feet of her husband, surprised even herself by offering the trickster her hand.

“Thank you,” she murmured with a smile like rough-cut glass. “I’ll still kill you if you touch one hair on his head.”

“I have no doubt of that,” Loki assured her. “But you may be assured it was gladly done.”

She straightened abruptly, staring him down- but Loki’s smile never wavered, and Stephanie seemed to decide that she had no reason to doubt him after all. They shook hands soberly before Steph reclaimed her husband so that Thor could gather up the Tesseract, the so-called mindstone, and Loki.

“Friends,” he boomed, offering them a grin that was somehow both regal and childlike in its joy and relief. “It has been a glorious day. I will return to you.”

As usual, that was all the warning they got before Thor- and Loki, apparently- was gone in a swirl of capes and semi-supernatural runes.

“What the fuck,” Tony growled, suddenly feeling deeply resentful. “I’m pretty sure this is the only time anyone has ever stolen my thunder so completely that actual thunder was involved. I was going to die to save New York, you know.”

By this time, even Wilson and Carter had caught up with them.

“Ask him what you asked me,” their newest member ordered his friend. Agent Thirteen smiled.

“Are you complaining?”

“Yes! No. I don’t know."

Tony wasn't all that sure it mattered very much- it was slowly sinking in that the fight was over, and they'd not only kept the aliens from taking over but done it without losing anyone on their side. “I guess I can live with not dying. I’m starving- can we get shwarma? I haven’t had shwarma in- I don’t know. Way too long. But not as long as our Barneses, I guess- you guys haven’t had shwarma at all, have you?”

“It’s mostly lamb and bread,” Natasha explained in an undertone; Tony was pretty sure he could _hear_ her smirk. “It’s a bit of a team tradition- whoever has the most recent brush with death gets to dictate the after-party.”

“Shwarma,” the Hulk rumbled approvingly. Steph nodded, stepping delicately over Tony’s still-unresponsive helmet so she could take her husband’s hand again.

“We can do lamb and bread.”

Their team- and the Fantastic Four, and Sharon Carter- nodded to a man.

“Great,” Tony grinned. “Lamb and bread- _and sauce_ , Romanova, even you must know it’s _all_ about the sauce- it is.”


	22. comin' in home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> life goes on in the aftermath: at SHIELD, under Tony's roof, on Asgard. Steph and Bucky go back to Brooklyn at last.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't believe it's done! thank you much much much to everyone who has read some or all of it, and especially for lovely lovely comments that sometimes make all the difference between figuring out sticky plot points and putting things off indefinitely. many heartshapes all around!

“They're really going with 'The Avengers.'”

“Yes, sir.”

Phil would have understood if Fury had responded by demanding what, exactly, the ex-Champions would be avenging now that they’d defeated the Chitauri and, apparently, convinced Loki to go straight. Instead, the bigger man jerked his head towards the Baxter Building- because of course his office would afford him a clear view of the comings and goings of the Fantastic Four.

“Who knew Stark could play so nicely with the other kids?”

Coulson gave a small shrug.

“Apparently an alien invasion brings out the best in him. I was more surprised by Natasha making friends so quickly.”

Phil would never tell her she was the only one he hadn’t been completely sure of, but it was good to know she felt ready to put her past behind her. Fury nodded.

“Not to mention Loki.”

They had very little idea what would develop on that front, but Thor seemed more than confident that Loki’s surrender on top of the safe return of the Tesseract amounted to much more than a Memo of Understanding between Earth and Asgard.

“I told you they were ready."

His boss smirked.

“So you did. Are you sure you and Carter can handle it?”

“There’s a good chance Stark will persuade Captain Barnes to take command.”

He wasn’t a hundred percent sure whether his argument was that he’d have help managing the team, or that he was more than willing to accept all the hazards of working with Iron Man, the Hulk and Agent Romanova if it meant working closely with the absolute heroes of his teenage years. Fury raised his visible eyebrow, but didn’t call Phil’s bluff.

“That would be something,” he said mildly. His voice was flat and matter-of-fact, but the expression in his eye was kind. “Welcome to Stage 2. Congratulations, Agent Coulson.”

There were questions still to be asked, consequences still to be faced. It wasn't just a promotion- it was a new challenge in ways they couldn't even guess at yet. For the first time in their working relationship, it seemed appropriate to favour Nick Fury with a real, unguarded smile.

“Thank you, sir.”

* * *

 “I still can’t believe you let me talk you into this.”

Clint did seem genuinely giddy with unanticipated triumph. He had his arm around Natasha’s waist, but kept darting startled looks in her direction as if he wasn’t convinced she realised where they were. It gave him the air of a little boy who’d fought for the right to stay up past his bedtime, and having won it had no idea what to do with himself except luxuriate in the victory. Sighing to herself, but not impatiently, Tasha settled into his loose embrace.

“We  _have_  done this before,” she reminded him. Most of the time it had been her idea, though, and certainly she had never had to _talk_ Clint into anything.

“Yeah, but this is _on base.”_

He kissed her neck, gleeful rather than passionate. Because his complete bemusement was more endearing than irritating, Natasha let him get away with it. She might have grabbed him by the shoulders and shown him how things were done where she came from, but Clint chose that moment to let go of her and dive sideways, disappearing halfway over the edge of the bed. “I got you a present! _”_

He resurfaced, grinning from ear to ear, with a bottle of vodka- somehow still ice cold- and two of Natasha’s own shot glasses.

“I’m not going to ask how you managed that,” she decided- Clint took great pride in his position at the top of the very short list of people who could still surprise Tasha Romanova from time to time, and she had found she quite liked that. “We’re hardly _on base_ , Barton- this is not the most shocking thing that has happened under Tony Stark’s roof.”

“If we live where our boss lives, we're on base," he argued, then shrugged nonchalantly. "It’s not like you and me drinking vodka in bed would’ve been that shocking at SHIELD, either. D’you think the kids’re all right?”

Natasha rolled her eyes.

“Are you worried about the kid who came out of a hand-to-hand fight _off Earth_ with a standing offer from Odin’s personal guard, or the one who took Brock Rumlow down in two moves?”

Clint beamed.

“That was _so_ awesome.”

It had been fairly inspiring, Natasha had to admit. Idly she wondered if Rumlow would be discharged or court-martialed before Stark’s lawyers nailed him in the civil courts.

“Pour,” she ordered; Clint touched his glass to hers solemnly before they downed their shots.

“D’you think they’ll stay? On the team, I mean.”

Natasha hadn’t thought they were exploring other options.

“Where else would they go?” 

“They might want to find out.”

She wasn’t jealous, Natasha told herself- not of the effortless intimacy they didn’t even have to think about, and not of the way Clint took it for granted that they could have any life they chose if they'd had enough of death and deception.

“What about us?”

He laughed somewhat uncertainly.

“Well, I wasn’t thinking about going to art school before the war broke out. Were you?”

That wasn’t what she’d meant at all. It had been one thing at SHIELD, when they had been part-time team members and part-time enforcers of a larger system- that sort of thing could only come naturally to a Soviet-trained agent for hire. This new thing, though- the Avengers- a private outfit called for a degree of personal loyalty Natasha wasn’t sure she’d ever learnt to give.

“Where do you see us fitting in on this team?”

Clint looked puzzled as to why she needed telling- from his perspective it must look like the same team, vastly improved by its recent additions.

“Same as before- we’re the sensible middle ground. More so now that Tony doesn’t have to answer to Fury.”

Natasha snorted.

“You think  _we_  are the sensible middle ground. You and me.”

Clint nodded serenely. Natasha jabbed him in the ribs with her elbow.

“Am I the only one who remembers Budapest?”

He laughed at that, but held his ground.

“We’re talking about a sliding scale from Tony Stark to the 40s soldier Catholics, with Birdman Sam and Dr. Hulk somewhere in the mix- and that’s without counting the Norse-god-alien-guys who can’t agree on whether they hate each other. Even with Carter back on board we’re going to be their best hope when it comes to acting normal in mixed company.”

It was, as Dr. Richards might have said, quite a scale. Natasha knocked back her shot by way of admitting that Clint might have a point; her partner grinned and reached to pour another. Natasha waved him off- she thought they were done talking for the evening.

“You’re sure this is what you want.”

Clint looked so young when he smiled like that.

“Are you kidding? This is going to be _amazing._ ”

Natasha decided she was willing to follow his lead. She moved to straddle her partner, smirking at Clint as he set the bottle down with a thump.

“I hope so,” she breathed, very close to licking his ear. “In that case I only have one question.”

 “Hmm?”

“What would your 40s Catholics say if they could see you now?”

He glanced down reflexively, watching her hands trail ever lower between them. The deep red of her manicured nails stood out like blood against his vest.

“I dunno.”

He affected his best Brooklyn drawl.

“‘Well goddamn done, son?’”

Natasha choked; Clint grinned wildly.  

* * *

For a long moment, all was silent in the hall of judgment. Loki steeled himself for disappointment and worse, then raised his eyes to meet the Allfather’s heavy gaze.

“Banished."

Odin nodded soberly.

“You are guilty of making war on an inferior species- of using weapons for which they were not prepared, of imposing your will on those powerless to resist, and of declaring yourself a worthy king long before anyone fit to make such a judgment had done so.”

Loki cringed- but even as he did, he realized that the man he had once called father was very close to smiling. “Thor did much the same once, you will remember. We have found that banishment answered very well in his case.”

Loki considered and then reconsidered the possibility that he had misunderstood. It was too generous by far, and Odin had always been considered just rather than merciful as a ruler. And yet Thor was already beaming like an addled child, breaking away from his friends to embrace either Loki or his father- whichever of the two failed to dodge his advances in time, most likely.

“Well, Son of Laufey?”

He returned startled eyes to his adjudicator. “Have you nothing to say to me?”

Not for the first time during these long proceedings, Loki asked himself what the captain and his wife might do in his position. All too often the answer was that they would never have done whatever he had to put himself in such a position in the first instance, but in this case Loki thought he knew the answer.

“Your judgment is law,” he murmured, giving the expected reply before raising his eyes again, looking not for the ruler of the nine realms but for the man who had found him, saved him, and raised him without ever demanding- or receiving- either gratitude or recompense. “I am sorry, my Lord, for everything that has been suffered on my account.”

He saw Odin’s eye widen, but it was Frigga who stepped forward and threw her arms around the prisoner who had only just been sentenced.

“Loki,” she murmured. Of course this was her doing, he thought- quite likely she had even convinced Odin that he had chosen to give Loki another chance of his own accord. Loki returned her embrace with grateful, faintly trembling hands.

“My Lady, I have missed you constantly.”

“Good,” Frigga retorted. “Perhaps this time you will not stay away so long.”

That Odin did not immediately object was an admission Loki had not dared to hope for. They meant for him to return, then- they really were offering him redemption, if only he could show himself worthy.

“Mother,” he whispered; Frigga smiled. 

“Yes,” she assured him. “Loki, astín mín, how can you still have to ask?”

He had not realised that was what he had been doing until he had his answer. He closed his eyes and breathed another of the captain’s particular phrases into the soft folds of his mother’s ceremonial cloak.

“Thank you.”

The wife of the Allfather stroked Loki’s hair as though he were a child again.

* * *

Back in Brooklyn Heights at long, _long_ , last, Stephanie shook out her just-washed hair and let herself into the bedroom. She found her husband on the phone with Howard’s son- presumably Tony had remembered something _else_ they had to eat, or watch, or look up on the internet before he saw them in less than twelve hours. Lounging comfortably in their bed, half-dressed and still flushed from the kind of near-scalding shower he could now afford, Bucky looked too vulnerable by half.

“A chéadsearc,” Steph whispered, trailing off because she hadn’t really thought farther ahead than that. He caught her eye at once, waving her over with his free hand as his conversation with Tony wound to a close.

“-perfectly fine, ace. We’ll give you a call in the morning, okay? Yeah, you too. G’night.”

He reached for her as soon as he’d set the phone down, grinning mostly to himself.

“I take it back- that one definitely thinks he’s our-“

Bucky faltered, taken by surprise when Steph all but climbed into his lap so she could grab him in a clumsy, desperate hug. “Hi there.”

He sat up so he could take her weight more comfortably, still smiling but now also watching her with those sharp, knowing eyes.

“You okay, Stephanín?”

He worried about her all the time, Steph thought tenderly- and then all she could see was her husband on his knees, trying to reassure her even with his last breath.

“Bucky-”

She’d witnessed her share of awful things with the SSR- but it had never been _his_ blood covering her hands, _his_ frightened eyes glazing over even as he struggled to stay conscious for her sake. Before she knew it Steph was sobbing wretchedly, crying so hard that she could hear the scream in every tortured inhale.

“Oh,” Bucky muttered. “Okay. C’mere, a chroí.”

She gasped against his neck, clawing at his shoulders as though she was sure she’d lose him forever if she let go. Bucky sighed, deeply sympathetic, and enfolded her in the most secure embrace he knew how to provide. He rocked her gently, keeping her close as they waited out the unexpected storm of her anguish.

“It’s over now,” he promised when Steph’s terrified tears had run their course. “It’s done- they’re not coming back. This time for real, Steph.”

That wasn’t the problem, though- or not the whole problem. She took a shuddering breath, so close to his face that it was very nearly a kiss, and did what she could to make Bucky understand. 

“You were gone. He just- there was  _nothing_ , I couldn’t even- and then he-”

Every second he’d been gone Steph had felt her husband’s absence like an open wound, made worse by the constant, aching awareness that Loki’s final desecration had made it so that her boy had given everything he had for home and country _twice_ and never even got a Christian burial for his trouble. Even now, wrapped in his arms and wholly grateful for his steady heartbeat close to her chest, Steph was paralysed by the knowledge of how close she’d come to losing him for good.

“You can’t die,” she whispered, still transfixed by horrific visions of what could have been. She pictured herself returning from this most recent fight, not to her own dear love safe in their bed but to a still-gleaming marble headstone in some military graveyard of distinguished pedigree. Tony would have gone with her, holding her hand while she promised the etched letters of that beloved name that she’d finished what he started, and would catch up as soon as ever she could if he’d just rest easy and wait with Howard like he’d wanted her to do in 1945. “You  _can’t,_  okay, or I’ll-”

She cut herself off before she tried to make him promise things he couldn’t possibly guarantee. Lost for words, fighting for air, Steph pulled back enough to cradle his face in her shaking hands.

“Promise you won’t ever talk to me about divorce again.”

She’d changed tracks too quickly for him to follow the logic of it- Bucky looked very blank for a second. When he realized what she was talking about, he gave a little gasp of recognition.

“I’m sorry,” he breathed, immediately grasping what Steph hadn’t said- if Loki had gone through with things, that would have been the last conversation they ever had. She nodded- she’d relived every word of that exchange more times than she ever planned to admit to him, and knew damn well that things would never have got so completely out of hand if she'd tried harder to keep a handle on her temper.

“You know I wouldn’t ever leave you, though.”

Thank God he nodded readily, and right away.

“I guess I just wanted to know you knew it was your call.”

That did explain why he’d looked so much like he had when he was seventeen and determined to stop the girl he loved from shackling herself to a cripple for the rest of their lives. Steph fought down a hysterical giggle.

“You offered to divorce me because you wanted me to know I had a choice.”

Bucky flinched as if saying the word too many times could make it true, but he nodded seriously.

“Idiot,” Stephanie sighed, tapping his cheek with her left hand so he had to notice the rings he'd put there himself. “I’ve always had a choice, Bucky.”

He smiled, but still looked so unsure- not of her, but of his ability to be whatever it was he thought she wanted from him.

“I guess I just figured, if there was ever somewhere else you’d rather be-“

“There isn’t. Bucky, there won’t ever be.”

He kissed her temple, then rested his cheek against her hair as one of his hands ran slowly up and down her arm. They stayed like that, taking stock of things together, until Bucky shifted awkwardly and Steph realized she was still sitting mostly on top of him.

“Bucky,” she grumbled, meaning that he should _say something_ once in a while instead of convincing himself that slowly losing all feeling in his legs was part of the ‘for better or worse’ deal. He smiled instead of trying to defend himself, pulling her close again as soon as they were both lying down.

“You’re so stupid,” Steph complained, brushing his hair out of his eyes by way of apology, reprimand, or both. “A Shéamais, ta mo chroí istigh ionat.”

He kissed her softly.

“Mo ghrá thú, a Mháire. You want we should tell Tony thanks but no thanks?”

She tilted her head at him, working out how he’d ended up there, of all places.

“Quit the team? Aren’t they _your_ Avengers?”

Bucky gave a self-conscious huff of exasperated laughter.

“I guess that’s their job done, then, isn’t it? Colour me avenged, Agent Steph.”

They’d more than done what they’d joined up to do, too- by now, they’d exceeded their original brief so completely that they’d even seen the blue and glowing Tesseract thing safely home and made friends with the guys who’d lost it in the first place.   

“You like them, though.”

“I don’t _think_ they’ll refuse to ever see us again unless we sign on for life.”

Steph smiled, but shook her head.

“You like it, I mean. Having a team again.”

They liked having him, too- Steph had seen with her own eyes how Stark’s team had transformed under the influence of a leader who had more experience in the field than in a lab.

“Only as long as you’re on it,” Bucky insisted. He didn’t even sound wistful- he just meant that he’d go where she led, as he always had done and always would, so long as people stopped trying to kill him long enough to goddamn let him. And yet- it was like Steph had said to Erskine, the very first time they’d met. She wouldn’t ever be the one to stop her husband from finding his best self, and if that meant a second lifetime watching his back then …it would be gladly done. Gladly and fiercely, with hell to pay for whatever idiot got in her way this time.

“I’m in,” she assured him, then surprised him by raising their joined hands to her lips the way he did when he was being a particularly hopeless romantic. “All in all the way, remember?”

Bucky smiled so sweetly that she couldn’t possibly doubt that he did.

“Do you promise, Stephanie mine?”

“Cross my heart.”

“Well then,” he murmured, and kissed his wife because that was how they sealed all their best deals. “I guess you're stuck, aren't you?”

Steph laced her fingers together at the back of his neck, watching Bucky’s eyes widen at the invitation which was more like a command- if he made her wait she’d probably just drag him to her and have her way in any case.

“Lucky me.”

She was half expecting him to laugh and ask when she’d turned into a sap too, but Bucky only shook his head impatiently before he pressed her back, slow and deliberate, against the brand new sheets that probably cost the same as half their furniture combined.

“It’s not _luck_ when it’s you’n me, Steph.”


End file.
